#but my main always has and always will be tabris

[hirazuki]

The recent fanfic asks reminded my of my old DAO writing -- which I never brought over to AO3 when I moved there from ff.net; I was still in the depths of my divorce with the franchise when that happened -- so I hopped over to ff.net for the first time in ages to glance at them.

... and I had never realized until now that, reading them, you'd think my main Warden was a Cousland 🤣

[vigilskeep]

so i've played the whole trilogy many many times and origins has always been my favorite installment BUT i've never actually played a dwarf warden before, i've played every other origin at least once (tabris and cousland are my faves so they're the ones i mostly replay) mostly just cause playing a dwarf character doesn't typically interest me. but your aeducan posting has got me Thinking and i may roll a dwarf warden for the first time because of you cause i am a SLUT for messy royal family dynamics and i have always wondered how different ostagar plays with a returning warden.....

the reactivity on returning to orzammar is pretty incredible. i’ve never done it as a brosca but as an aeducan it is absurd how many npcs they wrote origin-specific dialogue for. and that’s on top of how much the origin context can affect your decisions about the throne in the main quest!! it’s rlly well done

[kanaevamon]

Tabris/17th Angel/Angelworu reference sheet 2024

Ref sheet for the current design of my take on Kaworu's Angel form

height chart alt / backview - Wings of Light alt

(infodump about his biology and design under the cut)

Disclaimer: all the information in this post applies only to my AU version of Kaworu, don't take this as canon info about his biology as an Angel.

　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　

Feel free to take inspiration from the design or any other supplementary info in this post (⁠◍⁠•⁠ᴗ⁠•⁠◍⁠)

　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　

Introduction: Kaworu Nagisa is a genetic hybrid of human and the 1st Angel - Adam, born as a result of the Contact Experiment. He has lived and looked like a regular human up until entering the Central Dogma. The proximity of another Angel (Lilith) has resulted in a sudden change in gene expression, activating dormant Angel genes. The result was some kind of a rapid transformation/metamorphosis from an almost fully human body to that of an Angel. It has been referred to as Tabris, the 17th Angel, with this particular form being described as the High Angel Gene Expression form.

Anatomy and physiology: Standing at over 3 meters tall, Tabris is the second smallest Angel after microscopic Ireul. Its limited growth compared to other Angels is a result of constraints put on its body by the human part of the DNA. In general proportions, Tabris resembles Adam and subsequently - the Evas, with the exception of its overtly elongated limbs. Like Adam, it emits light, though not nearly as bright, and sprouts Wings of Light, spanning over 18 meters in width with an additional tail-like structure

During the metamorphosis, its core has resurfaced to the center of the chest, changing its position from the one more akin to that of the human heart. The central core containing S² Engine is very tough and resistant to damage but very sensitive to touch. It can become malleable and flesh-like if the AT Field is lowered enough. Instead of beating, it produces a soft humming sound similar to that of the Sun. Two smaller cores underneath it seem to help redirect generated energy to the lower parts of the body.

Additional core situated inside the neck area works as a transmiter, condensing energy from the S² engine before relaying it to the head. Such adaptation is a result of a much higher and centralised brain function compared to other Angels, which requires more energy to work properly.

Excess energy manifests itself in a form of three halos - two vertical ones with spike-like extrusions above the head and a horizontal one around the neck core.

As a member of asexually reproducing species, post-metamorphosis Tabris lacks any sexual characteristics, both internal and external.

Due to the volatile state of its DNA, there is a possibility of further mutations occurring if not killed or removed from the Central Dogma in time.

With enough damage delt to the central core, the transformation can be reverted, though not completely. The resulting form known as the Low Angel Gene Expression form (sketch of this form) is almost identical to pre-metamorphosis Kaworu, with the exception of visible main core and red markings adorning his body (basically looking exactly like the draft sketch) It is a result of the damaged core not being able to provide enough energy to sustain its fully changed form.

Thanks to the extremely powerful AT Field, Tabris' main core can be completely destroyed only by either him voluntary lowering the AT Field or being pierced by the Spear of Longinus. Destruction of the S² Engine results in Angel’s death.

Design notes: It is by no means a wholly new design, just a mere evolution of the ones that came before it. Two main inspirations for the design (like always) have been draft sketches and Adam. With Kaworu’s body being that of a human and Adam being a humanoid entity, I've decided to stick with a clearly humanoid design for Tabris. As much as I love more abstract Angels, I feel like this Angel/human duality is essential to Kaworu's character.

The most drastic change in this instance of the design is its shoulder area. I think these pylon-like structures work much better than spikes as it likens Tabris more to Adam (from what I gathered, these serve as restraints for Adam and Evas but I don't really care :v). Same goes for the change in proportions. Lengthy limbs add to the uncanniness and distance the silhouette from that of a regular human.

Here you can check out my design inspo board I went for with this iteration of Tabris

　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　

Bonus info:

Here are some design explorations for Tabris that haven't been posted before + bonus Kawoshin :3

A few years back I've made sort of a rough storyboard for a short transformation animation, check it out here

At one point I had plans for a comic for this AU, which plot has been - I kid you not - revealed to me in a dream xD It has never come to a fruition because I suck at writing compelling stories

When it comes to its identity, Tabris would identify as agender and use it/its and he/him pronouns

　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　

That's it for this long-ass post, if you're still here thanks for reading :D If you have any questions and/or suggestions, feel free to shoot me a DM or an ask (I'll probably come up with some shit on the spot because there's no rhyme or reason to any of this lore, it's just a bunch of random ideas rattling around in my head xD)

[lottiesnotebook]

whump time! "hostage/ransom" for luna/zevran or luna/anyone of your choice?

Thank you for the Origins prompt, my love, I hope you enjoy this in the morning.

Zevran Arainai/Luna Tabris, whump, hurt/comfort, kidnapping, Origins!Crows, post-game

@adainesjacket | @dadrunkwriting

a shrike to your sharp and glorious thorn

When his past finally catches up to him, Zevran does not, in truth, expect anyone to come. He left his fair Warden behind on Ferelden's shores, far away from his beloved Antiva and the many demons it holds for him. He broke her heart to save her, or at least, he likes to imagine he has. It's a cold comfort (it's all the comfort he has), to believe that somewhere, across the Amaranthine, a beautiful woman is weeping for him.

They hang him in a crow-cage while he's still identifiable, of course. Once they take his eyes and his hands, he could be any crippled begger from the streets of Antiva, a stolen name slapped below his body to ensure the Fledgelings remember the only truth they need to know - that no-one leaves the Crows and lives to tell the tale.

This is why he did not take her hands on the pier and say come with me, say watch my back, and I'll watch yours, say stay at my side, even now, when I go into the dark. He knew even then where his story would end, and it is a comfort to know she remembers him as he was on the pier, hale and handsome and pressing all the kisses to her fingers he would never have the chance to give her in life. She will not recall Zevran-the-prisoner, Zevran-the-broken, Zevran the lesson they will teach all young Crows on the perils of falling in love with the mark. She will remember him still warm from her bed, not shivering twenty feet above Antiva City's main market.

A flash of silver catches his eye, and his stomach sinks before his eyes can even tell him his first assumption is correct - Luna's face is upturned towards him like a flower towards the sun, her eyes dark as bruises, and she should not be here, she should not see him like this, and yet, he knows with certainty that of course, there is nowhere else she would be. She always said she'd follow him anywhere, and an ocean is nothing to an Archdemon.

Her mouth is a grim line, her jaw set, and if he could call to her, he would tell her to run, to flee before they catch her, before they hang her in a cage beside hers, before she becomes a hostage to ensure his good behaviour, and then a corpse to show any wavering Crows what happens when the Guild is betrayed. Even she cannot save him. Even she cannot kill them all.

He is wrong, of course, as he was wrong about her being an easy contract, as he was wrong when he told himself that she could share his bed without stealing his heart. When she comes for him, she leaves a swathe of red through the Arainai compound, fledgelings and hired guards and old Crows who should have known better cut down in her wake as though they are nothing, mere obstacles in the way of her goal. When she comes for him, there is blood on her armour and in her white, white hair, and smeared across her lips when she kisses him, hard and fierce and ruthless.

When she comes for him, there is none of the gentleness he fell in love with in her, and he loves her all the more for that, as she unfastens his chains and pulls him close and cauterises the stumps where his little fingers used to be.

"You should not have come, cara mia," he tells her, weakly. Outside the door he can hear the growls of the beasts who follow in his wake, and the screams of their prey, his former comrades. "You should have let me succeed, or let them kill me. You have made many enemies this day."

"I'll always have enemies," she retorts, slinging an arm around his waist to pull him upright. "What's more important is that I keep my promises."

He allows the memories of their every conversation to flicker before his eyes, confirming what he already knows: "You promised me nothing." He did not allow her to. He would not remember her as false, as treacherous, as another person who promised him things only the Maker's mercy could give.

She shakes her head, smiles, and her teeth are bright as daggers and a hundred times as sharp, and she does not look entirely mortal, not any more. "A long time ago, I promised myself nobody would take what I love from me again. I'm not letting you make an oathbreaker of me."

It is the first time she's said aloud that she loves him, outside bedroom whispers easily repudiated in dawn's unforgiving light. He lets his head fall against her shoulder, and allows her bloody-bright love to consume him.

[dellamortethelesser]

Nadasa Thorne is so important to me as someone who’s been cradling Mahanon Tabris to his chest as his main Hero of Ferelden for two years. Veilguard gave me a perfect timeline to finally critically examine what Mahanon looks like down the line, two decades removed from the Fifth Blight.

Mahanon’s role was always, to me, a critical examination of the “perfect victim”; not only was Mahanon an imperfect victim in every way (angry, reactive, often vindictive, an avenger more than not) but he was also 20, trans, and had no real guidance after the worst was over. When a person who made hard, gutting decisions for the sake of their own survival is then granted a position of power and authority and no further guidance, he’s not going to start making better choices. And I didn’t want him to—he was never supposed to BE the sort of person who emulated abject goodness. I wanted his story to be gritty and real to ME.

Finally, though, I can pull back and examine what that does to someone cyclically. Nadasa was 16 when Mahanon conscripted him; ten years before the events of Veilguard, right around the events of Inquisition kicked up. Mahanon was the legendary Hero of Ferelden, but through Nadasa’s eyes I’m finally allowed to see the man he has become and always was, apart from and outliving his own myth.

Mahanon had no mentor example to rely on and so his only blueprint was his father. Nadasa ended up with blurred lines for their relationship; Mahanon was mentor and myth, father and legend and friend all at once. There was no clear distinguishing line between any of these things—and there should have been. Mahanon isolated Nadasa, unintentionally, due to his own PTSD, and triangulated him against other Wardens because he thought they couldn’t be trusted.

He instilled Nadasa with a strict “us vs them” mentality (a combination of survivor’s guilt and a belief that Duncan only wanted warm bodies to throw at the darkspawn) and, in tangent with his constant pushing of responsibility onto Nadasa that he wasn’t ready for, made Nadasa someone aloof and apart even from other wardens. He had no real support system outside of him: all Nadasa had was rank he hadn’t earned and social clout that came from being the apprentice to the Hero of Ferelden.

When Mahanon left for his Calling—where he did not say goodbye and gave Nadasa the responsibility of mailing off his farewell letters—Nadasa had nothing left. Mahanon saw himself as a paragon of what a Grey Warden should be, but not as a good man or a good politician. He wanted Nadasa to be all of those things, but with only Mahanon as an example, Nadasa could only ever turn out to be just like him.

The narrative arc of Veilguard puts Nadasa into a position where he can have that team and that support and find a way to lead them. But when I explore his arc outside of the context of being Rook, all he has is a legacy unaddressed. He can either keep carrying Mahanon’s because no one else will—because he loves Mahanon even if he doesn’t understand him, because nobody knew Mahanon better—or he can let it go and be the man that Mahanon wanted him to be rather than the one Mahanon made him to be.

Nadasa Thorne can perpetuate the cycle or break it. I’m really glad to see that I can have that with my two wardens.

[jean-dieu]

Bonjour.

FINALLY, I am doing a pinned post!

Get to know me, the Man, the Legend.

I'm JEAN-DIEU, or Jean. 24 years old, Fr*nch, any pronouns. I'm a PhD student in AI and vaguely an artist sometimes. I love to create blorbos to obsess with.

I'm into a bunch of stuff you can learn more about just below! If you want to chat with me, feel free to send a DM, I'm always up to meet new people! Link, fandom, ocs and stuff under the cut!

My stuff :

#my-art will get you all my beautiful and awesome drawing (i am extremely talented)

#my-writings will get you all my writing in a language I don't speak correctly

#my-rambles will get you unhinged thoughts and co.

My Fandom :

I am currently into :

Pathfinder, which includes both Owlcat Games (but mostly Wrath of the Righteous) and also the TTRPG

Dragon Age (most current and newest obsession)

The TTRPG community in general

Baldur's Gate 3

Warhammer 40k

My OCs :

Pathfinder:

Raphaël Esdras (he/him), Hellspawn Tiefling Inquisitor of Sarenrae. My main OC, the love of my life. Played in my WoTR campaign as well as in the video games. Rawful Good zealot with a martyr complex. (Romancing Sosiel)

Lazare Lune-De-Miel (he/him), Kyton-spawn Tiefling Bard/Warlock, faithful follower of Desna, Shelyn, Nocticula and Cayden Cailean. Small but loud, cheerful and incredibely optimistic. Has twelve moms. Accidently made a pact with a devil when he was 12.

Malthus "Ziel" Drezdan (he/him), Pitborn Tiefling Rogue/Bard, calistrian. Son of a disgraced Abadar cleric. Local weirdo. Scaly little brat. Inventor of emo folk in Golarion.

Zarathustra (he/him), Pitborn Tiefling (mother is a succubus) Alchemist. Vaguely follows Brigh. Climbed the social ladder one murder at a time. Poisonned a noble and married his wife. Except the wife was 100% ok with it. Smart, cunning, ruthless, cruel. Local evil man.

Eon Jarjayes (he/they/she in that order), human, rogue. Varisian Pirate. Ex-slave turned ruthless criminal. Nihilist. Will murder you for one corn chip.

Dungeon and Dragons:

Mycellius (he/they). Spore druid hexblood tiefling. Son of a Green Hag. Absolutely disconnected from reality. Speaks to mushroom. Has no concept of economy or hygiene, good or evil. Fascinated with death and decay.

Nym (he/they). Drider, Gloomstalker Ranger. Ex trophy husband turned drider. Shy, terrified man obsessed with his hair. Actually really sweet and kind deep down. Loves flower and sewing. Quiet and calm.

Dragon Age:

Aloysius Lavellan, Inquisitor, Dalish Elf. Sweet elven mage who's really trying his best to make it to the end. Shy and unassuming yet stubborn and determined. Extremely knowledgable on history, biology and magic, completely clueless about people. (Dating the Bull).

Garrett "Nacht" Hawke, Human. Edgiest mage of all of Thedas. Loves to fuck around and find out. Hates Fenris and yet they're dating.

Artemis Tabris. Rogue, City Elf, Warden. Denerim's own Robin Hood. A disappointment to his family. Still loves his dad very much. Easily angered, very agressive. Worst humor ever. (Dated Morrigan then went on to live happily with Zevran).

[shewolfofvilnius]

I've written an origin story for my Rook. Because I FINALLY decided who she'd be.

Warden.

Main Characters: Safyra Thorne (Rook), Loghain Mac Tir. Setting: Primarily 9:40 Dragon and 9:45 Dragon.

She was a child of no more than ten in the Denerim alienage when Warden Tabris and her friends were taken by the nobles, and heard stories once she grew older how Tabris slaughtered them for what they'd tried to do. She'd been taught by the other women of the alienage to protect herself.

The Grey Warden, Elissa Tabris, was her hero.

When the Mage-Templar war broke out years later, nowhere was safe. A group of noble fucks decided to try what they always did, while King Alistair and Queen Anora were out of town, and tried to purge the Alienage. The children were gathered in what was believed the most defensible (and most escapable) building in the alienage, but the nobles did NOT stop.

Then they ran up against Safyra Thorne, nearly twenty and mad as hell. Skilled with blade and bow in equal measure. It was eight on one. Then seven. Six. Five. Finally, the numbers game looked to catch up with her. Suddenly, an order to stop fighting. That voice. She'd heard that voice before.

Loghain Mac Tir. The father of the queen. The man who had been chief architect of the alienage' suffering a decade earlier, and since a repentant Grey Warden. Two of the five fled the field immediate, while a third died upon a charge. The remaining two surrendered at the Warden's call.

Of course, Safyra was still on the defensive. This was him. Grey Warden or no, this was the bastard who a decade ago had enabled so much horror. Then the noble who fled the field...returned with reinforcements.

A standoff ensued. Finally, Loghain asked Safyra "To where do you plan to take the children." Tersely, she acknowledged a meeting place several days walk away. "My daughter will see their holdings seized upon return. I had...a matter...to discuss with her while there was still time. I will escort you to the rendezvous so you can reunite these children with their families, under both my protection as a warrior, and my protection as the Queen's father. After the atrocities I committed, it is the bare minimum I can do. I have but one favor to ask."

"Which is?"

"Our paths shall cross one more time. On that day, I shall ask us to join us."

"Why not now?"

"The Wardens are...imperiled. I cannot explain further. When that matter is resolved, I have confidence, we SHALL meet again."

Loghain had kept his word. Mercenaries held by the purse strings of Denerim's nobles dared not cross the Queen's father, and Safyra and Loghain had led the children to safety. No fewer than three of the adults had put up fists against Loghain, and he allowed them to release their fury. He had gotten used to the scene.

"To my dying breath, I spend every moment of life atoning for that which I wrought. I have done all that I can for the present and must depart. I need not know your next plans. When the day comes, however, young Safyra, I ask you remember your promise."

After weeks of hiding, taking on a more nomadic presence that would almost have gotten the elves of Denerim's alienage confused for Dalish save only the lack of vallaslin, one day they were greeted by a trio of strange Dalish. "You shall find that peace has retaken your home. To those who wish to return, the Warden kept his word, our agents have confirmed it. For those who wish to follow a new cause, however, there is another option than the crumbling walls of the alienage waiting for the shemlen's next purge."

It was hahren Shianni who spoke up. "You are of the Dalish, then?"

The elf was hesitant, a lack of openness that caught Safyra's notice. "In a manner of speaking. All is not as you have been told. Much as the monster Loghain was the savior of your children, we come to you...as agents of Fen'Harel. We gather as the Dread Wolf seeks to restore that which our people have lost. Perhaps you tire of your existence being at the tenuous whim of the shems? "

The gasps were loud, the protests stern. "AGENTS OF FEN'HAREL?!"

Hidden in the woods, a dialogue broke on that stretched seemingly for a week of sunsets.

In the end, several of the adults elected to go with them, but the majority of the refugees elected to return home to Denerim. Their plight was known by the Queen herself, and by one of the Heroes of the Fifth Blight, her husband Alistair, and by the Wardens. Their once-promised autonomy had never fully come to pass, but they would not abandon their home, and certainly not for some strangers who talked of the trickster god.

Safyra returned to the alienage, but in the wake of the attempted purge, had been granted a Writ of Authority by no less than the King and Queen themselves. The young elf had been placed in charge of the safety of all inside.

Five years passed. Rumors of the Tevinter magister's attempt to doom the world had been met with shock. A new Divine had been declared, allegedly hand-picked by the elven Herald of Andraste and, most shockingly, it was the known consort and lover of Warden Tabris. The Warden's own father had confirmed as much, having seen the pair together on at least one occasion, though he wished to see her more as his health failed.

It was a good time for the elves of Thedas. And good times for the elves of Thedas usually meant trouble was coming. First it began with propagandists, and loudmouths handing out handbills and fliers to anyone who would take one. Talking of the "elven takeover"

Sentiments became tense. The king and queen were accused of being puppets of the elves who had saved Thedas twice over (particularly the Hero of Ferelden), humans tried to stoke fears of intermarrying with elves - a fear many elves themselves were happy to stoke due to the resulting progeny of such relationships almost always turning out human.

Some noble, seeking to use the chaos to regain power lost years earlier, hired a band of mercenaries to once again rabblerouse in the elves' home turf. The city guard descended on the alienage, but many still harboured old prejudices and tried to force the residents to retreat into homes for "safety" that the mercs would then try to burn.

Once again it was Safyra Thorne standing vigil, once again it was her reigning down hell upon the mercenaries. The king and queen's royal guard arrived, but seeing the city guard often aiding the mercenaries had sewn confusion.

One city guardsman had blade held high over a small child, ready to strike after the child had thrown a rock at the guard when he helped a mercenary - when he met his end at Safyra's dagger. A royal guard, however, had only seen her strike the guard and not seen the provocation, and moved to have her arrested and held for questioning. In the end, the mercenaries were run off - and several city guard were unaccounted for - but the royal guard had also taken in six elves for questioning.

Rather than the guard captain arriving for Safyra's questioning, however, it was Loghain, now looking significantly worse-for-wear than the last time she'd seen him.

"I wish we were meeting again under better circumstances. They say you killed a city guard in cold blood."

"He was aiding the mercenaries, Warden Loghain he was about to murder a child."

"For however much it is worth, I believe you. The King and Queen believe you. They've ordered a royal pardon for all six of you, and both the royal and city guards are to be held to account. Sadly, change is slow."

"How are you even here?"

"Unlike the Hero of Ferelden, I make it a point to still visit my family whenever life affords an opportunity. I suspect not many more opportunities remain for either of us, but whatever the demands of a Warden, I refuse to have my daughter believe her father abandoned her."

"I have to admit, I thought she'd come back to see him..."

"The Warden whom you so clearly idolize has become consumed by a quest whose nature I cannot elaborate upon. Not even the Divine herself seems capable of reaching her consistently. Even when the Wardens need her mettle now more than ever."

"And let me guess - you want me to join you in exchange for the guards being held accountable and the people being pardoned."

"Certainly not. But much like the Warden's father, I am an old man whose time draws near. I suspect this will be the last time our paths cross. If you wish to remain with your people, I will certainly not fault you. But if you wish to join the Grey Wardens, now is your opportunity. It is one that will not come again."

"Given what your daughter and son-in-law's Writ seemed to be worth, and given who you are, why should I trust a word you've said. Why should I go with you?" "In the forest. The three elves. The 'Agents of Fen'Harel'. They knew my movements because I allowed them to know. Knew it would provide greater safety to your people. I have seen your people's 'Dread Wolf' with my own eyes, I have walked the very Fade itself next to him, alongside the Inquisitor and her love."

"I ask why I should believe you and yet you make more outrageous claims?"

"The Inquisition is disbanded. Because she, because the Inquisitor, could no longer trust her own people. Your first, best opportunity to both help defend your people - both from the Darkspawn menace and from the larger threats at play - is to join with the Grey Wardens. Learn our ways. Go where they send you. Something is coming. Something massive, and something I suspect I shall not live to see. Something I suspect neither the Hero of Ferelden herself nor my son in law may live to see either. When that day comes, I wish someone I can trust to be in a position to move against the threat unleashed.

"Hire someone on a retainer then. My people here need me."

Safyra started to rise but four royal guards drew closer. "I said that your joining the wardens would not be in exchange for the pardons and accountability for the others, but I never said anything about you. You killed a city guard in plain view of his superiors and subordinates AND the royal guard, and no one has been able to find a witness that the guard planned to strike a child. You are to be charged with murder, lest you come with me.

"You no good rotten snake in the grass. I knew, I KNEW you were a lying, two-timing, backstabbing piece of..."

"I offer you the alternative against old prejudices which demand their pound of flesh. Stay if you wish, and you face the hangman's noose. Alternately, in one gesture, I can invoke the Wardens' Right of Conscription, and you become my charge until you have formally joined."

"Why not just tell me I don't really have a choice to begin with."

"You ALWAYS have a choice. You just don't have a good choice. Not even my daughter can fight your people's every battle. You did the right thing, but unfortunately it has cost you. This is often the way of the world. The true choice is what you choose to do about it. Join the Grey Wardens, and live to fight another day, live to help make the world a bit better for elves and for everyone else - or be the sacrificial lamb today to build movement tomorrow towards something better. Fight or die, THAT is your choice. If you fight, you shall die still, but if you die, you shall never get to fight." Loghain's eyes grew steely across from the young woman's vivid blues, taking her measure.

"Then invoke your right. But know I'll curse your name - and that of every noble whose path I cross - from now until the day I die."

"I would expect nothing less, Warden-Candidate Thorne. When we depart, we shall return to your home. Pack your blades and bow and say your goodbyes, and then we depart."

[miladydewintcr]

Hello! Happy Friday!! I'm here for DADWC ☺️

Prompting for Eleri Tabris: your OC talking about your favorite quest!

- asexualtabris 💜

Thank you, I had so much fun with this one!! My opinions on the other main quests in DAO bounce around a lot depending on my mood, but I am always always so excited for the Landsmeet!! So here are some letters between Eleri and Anora in the aftermath of that!

(For context, Eleri spared Loghain and set up a marriage between Alistair and Anora <3)

For @dadrunkwriting

Dear Warden-Commander,

Thank you once again for sparing my father’s life, despite all that he’s done to you. I am eternally in your debt.

I’m writing in hope that we might exchange ideas, so to speak. I’ll tell you how best to interact with my father, if you’ll tell me what to do about my new husband. He’s making a rather deliberate effort to avoid me, and while I don’t begrudge him the sentiment, in public at least I’d prefer we present a united front. In private, he may hate me, if he wishes. I care not.

Looking forward to your swift reply, I’m sure.

Signed,

Queen Anora Theirin

-

Dear Anora,

I’m not using your title. Titles mean nothing to me. You can just call me ‘Eleri’, if you’d prefer it.

I’d prefer-

Tips for dealing with your father would be most appreciated. I will say, I’m finding I enjoy his company far more than I thought I would. He has a surprisingly good sense of humour, and I’ve noticed we seem to come to the same judgements about most people we meet, more-or-less around about the same time. I can see why he found such success as a leader, he has excellent taste.

For Alistair- believe me when I say that he is upset with me, not you. It was a horrific thing for me to do, arranging a marriage between someone I saw as a cousin a friend and a woman practically a stranger to us both. He does, of course, hate your father, but I’d hope he of all people wouldn’t impose the sins of a parent upon their offspring.

He appreciates when you don’t take yourself too seriously. Perhaps try cracking a few jokes with him? If you’d rather take a more material route, he enjoys gifts of runestones or of little carved statuettes. Monsters, in particular, seem to be favourites.

It will take time, as I’m sure you understand, but I have faith that he will come around. He may never forgive me, but he will forgive you. You’ve done nothing wrong, after all.

- Eleri Tabris

-

Dear Ser Tabris,

Please accept my sincerest thanks! I sent a servant to the market in search of a little statuette, and she returned with a beautiful little dragon carved from jade. It cost a considerable amount, but it was worth it for the smile it coaxed from my husband. It was his first genuine smile, I think, directed at me.

For my father, I would advise you to be direct with him. He’s never been one for the polite civilities of court, and he will appreciate if you speak your mind with him instead of attempting to obfuscate your true feelings. Even if you disagree on a matter, he will still appreciate the honesty.

If you seek to win his favour with gifts, I suggest maps. He isn’t too particular about place or function- they can be outdated, covered in decorative illustrations, scrawled with notes. I’m not sure what he sees in them, but he has collected them since I was a child. Now he’s with you Wardens, he shall have to rebuild that collection from scratch.

Thank you for indulging me and providing such sound advice. I know you’re an incredibly busy woman.

Signed,

Queen An-

I do hope, perhaps, when all this is over, it wouldn’t be too presumptuous of me to ask if we might spend a little time together as friends? At court I am typically vastly outnumbered by men, and as such I have so few female friends. You had Alistair’s approval, once, and it seems you’ve earned my father’s. I feel we would make a good match.

Signed,

Queen Anora Theirin

-

Dear Anora,

I’m not sure what you look for in a friend, exactly. I would not fit in particularly well at court, I fear, and I’ve no interest in playing nice for noblemen.

Your father has told me stories of your childhood- nothing embarrassing, don’t panic, but I’m having a little trouble reconciling the poised, elegant queen I met in Denerim with this absolute rascal of a girl with skinned knees and mud on her skirts. If she’d like to make my acquaintance, I think perhaps I could consider a friendship.

- Eleri (Just Eleri, please, if we’re to be friends)

-

Dear Eleri (Just Eleri. Since we’re friends.),

I’ve not seen that girl in a very long time. I should think she’s bursting to get out and have some fun.

There’s a decorative lake at the estate I grew up on. With my father, legally speaking, as good as dead, the estate is now mine.

I’m not sure there’s much chance for swimming in the Denerim alienage. If you’re able, I’d love to show it to you? I spent many a summer day there catching frogs, if you can believe it.

If you cannot swim, I shall teach you.

Your friend,

Anora

-

Dear Anora,

I cannot swim. It seems a useful skill to learn, though, and I’d appreciate the lesson.

Are we likely to be attacked by vengeful frogs?

Yours,

Eleri

-

Dear Eleri,

Maker, it’s been a while since a letter drew such a laugh from me! I would hope the frog population have long forgotten my past transgressions- but if not, I shall have the Warden-Commander of Ferelden to protect me, should I not?

Your friend,

Anora

[stop-breaking-my-heart-dragonage]

listen I love DAO, DA2, and DAI very much and will replay all three on repeat but DAO really spoiled me with the whole "origins" part, something DA2 and DAI severely lack.

In DAO, you get to play through one of six origins that show how you got recruited to the Grey Wardens and affects how you play. I play as a Tabris and that plays a part in every decision she makes from how she views the Grey Wardens as a whole, who she romances, what she does with Loghain at the landsmeet, etc. It's incredible because that origin you get adds so much to the immersion each playthrough.

But then there's DA2 which I do adore with all my heart, but I can't lie, the first time I played it was very much "Oh, I have to be this human named Hawke? and the only differences in backstory really come from whether I'm a mage or not ...Ugh, okay, but only because you showed me Carver and now I'm attached, I'll keep playing, I'm sure nothing bad will happen to him."

And then DAI, which I also adore, comes along and just, "Okay pick who you wanna be. Great, here's a paragraph detailing your backstory, but you get to start in the same spot no matter who you make your Inquisitor to be, have fun."

It's not like it's a deal breaker that we can't play through an origin first before jumping into the main story. The player can take that element into their hands to make up for it. We see it all the time with players sharing the upbringings and family dynamics for their Hawke, or fully fleshing out their Inquisitor and why they were at the conclave in the first place.

I think DA2 does this a little better since at least it feels like Hawke had a life before Kirkwall. Your mother and survivng sibling are reminders of that life, as are every mention of your dead sibling and father. You're always reminded that you're a Fereldan refugee. You lost everything to the blight and now you have to rebuild yourself up in a new city.

But the Inquisitor? A lot of times it feels like the Inquisitor didn't even exist until they fell out of the sky. Sure, Cassandra can ask you where you're from or Josephine will ask you questions about your life prior, but that's about it. it's so unfortunate because DAI was the perfect set up for a origin stories the same way DAO was; what lead the Inquisitor to be at the conclave? What specifically put them there?

The first time I played DAI, I didn't put much thought into my Inquisitor. It took me playing through DAO and DA2 and starting a replay of DAI to actually figure out my Inquisitor and you know what I ended up doing?

I used a DAO origin.

Yeah, we know that all the wardens exist and the player picking their character decides where Duncan will be to recruit them and the others are just shit outta luck. I decided my Lavellan's actually Surana who escaped the circle with Jowan and she eventually joined the Dalish and adopted a new name after he died. Lemme tell you, roleplaying that as my Inquisitor's backstory makes everything in DAI just 10x better.

Every staff Ash crafts is named after Jowan. She wasn't born Dalish but her cover story says she was, and she slips up a lot. Her accent doesn't sound typically Dalish. Threnn tells her "Loghain was super cool actually" and Ash flashes back to when Jowan was taken by Loghain's men and when she tracked him down to Redcliffe only to find out Loghain planted him there to poison the arl, he was caught and tortured by the arl's wife, she begged a pair of wardens to let him go if they found him.

Ash is very against blood magic after it eventually killed Jowan and she isn't shy about expressing it. So you know Varric pulled my Hawke, a blood mage, aside like, "Listen, keep the blood magic stuff to yourself, the Inquisitor has a thing about it." and Edgar just gives a thumbs up and keeps going, "man, blood magic bad, amirite?"

Every conversation Ash has with Solas and Vivienne is just her biting her tongue and forcing out, "...yeah, okay." She knows the Chantry and Circles are bullshit but can't go off about it because hmmm, you know an awful lot about this for being Dalish?

Ash and Cullen see each other again after ten years and both just, "Hmm... you look famil...liar.......... oh no."

But that's my point: If I'm going to replay DAI, I boot up DAO first. I play through the mage origin as Ash, and as soon as Jowan runs off screen, I quit out of the game to boot up DAI with a little "Ten Years Later" mumble to myself, and it's so much better.

Honestly if I could find a way to incorporate an unused origin into my Hawke's backstory, I probably would! Because DAO knew what it was doing and it's super effective. I can't gush about DAO enough, I swear.

I can only cross my fingers that DA4 y'know, goes back to it's origins.

[spainkitty]

okay i need the deets about your surana-lavellan i am so intrigued 👀🙏 -merrybandofmurders

@merrybandofmurderers

I'll have you know, I am OBSESSED with my Surana-Lavellan. I am OVERJOYED to tell you, every single one of my lurking followers, and the whole world all about her. 🥰🤩😍 Welcome to my Very Long Post to justify having Surana as my Lavellan!!

Okay! It starts with: I didn't put enough memory on the MS side of my Mac laptop 😅

I played DAO with my Cousland, went on to play DA2, but I went back and started my Surana file for funsies and Tabris as well. Just because I love building characters and I wanted to experience the other Origins. I fell IMMEDIATELY in love with my Surana. I played her with high Willpower, a bit of a bully and an arrogant one at that, who'd drunk the Chantry Kool-aid and was going to slowly, as she ventured out into the world, realize the Kool-aid was gross, and she and all mages deserve better. However, before I even finished the first few Main Quests (I think I did Broken Circle and Orzammar), I finished my DA2 playthru and my friend helped me set up for DAI.

This is where the lack of memory on my laptop comes in. I had to delete my Origins file to make room on my laptop for DAI. I didn't want to close down the entire partition and re-allot the memory so I just deleted everything but DAI. I was so sad and upset, I remade my Lanil Surana as Lanil Lavellan and added an entire amnesia-ridden backstory for her 🤣 Her personality and character growth was going to be along the same lines, and her appearance, of course. And then I set sail on DAI~

Basically: During Origins, someone *coughCullencough* helped her escape during Uldred’s Uprising and she couldn't get back. She barely escaped through a tunnel in the storage rooms full of giant spiders (a little bg for her DAI phobia 😉) and wandered around poisoned and pissed off with vague plans to go back home anyway when the Sabrae Clan picked her up. She ended up leaving with them instead to the Free Marches, but after everything with Uldred, didn't trust Merrill enough to stay. The blood magic and the demon on Sundermount scared her, especially since she's still a little Kool-aid drinker at heart at this time. Marethari eventually sent Lanil off to the Lavellan Clan and Lanil became a Second. Mainly because she was highly educated and a Healer with spells she could teach that they would never have heard of. Her becoming First was out of sheer moxie. She refuses to let anyone tell her she can't do something and she'd always been rather ambitious, aiming and being groomed for First Enchanter most of her life.

Along the way she does actually grow and change. She starts to care a lot more about elves and Elvhen, becomes fascinated by this history that was denied her during her Chantry-filled life, and throws herself into the culture with wide eyes. It's about more than being powerful, it's about wanting to use that power to make things better, to protect the People that have welcomed her and her magic and made her feel like she finally had a family. (Dregs of this inform who she is as an Inquisitor.)

Then, the Conclave. She's sent because she's Chantry-educated and knows the lay of the land well. She's FROM there; she has studied the geography and knows the politics. She can blend in better than any of them. When she and the Divine are blown into the Fade, though, the Nightmare doesn't just take her memories of that night and Corypheus, it took ALL of them. She had nearly nothing left and doesn't even know her own name for most of her story. She's just Lavellan, because Leliana found her belongings and the only personal information included was the Clan name: Lavellan. Dorian (I think? It might have been Sera) eventually dubs her "Lane" and she responds to it automatically. She doesn't get her memories back until after Into the Abyss, of course, which I played AFTER Wicked Eyes Wicked Hearts, and after her relationship Cullen was already pretty deep and "locked in".

I had a lot of fun with writing her and Cullen's first meeting and then after she figures out who she really is 🤣 Cullen definitely gaslit himself into thinking he's crazy for noticing how similar they looked/acted. Since she was much older, heavily scarred, and had vallaslin (and amnesia, so even her personality was affected in a way), he told himself he was being stupid, how could Surana be a Dalish elf now? She's probably dead and his one truly rebellious act was for nothing. Lavellan just looks *a lot* like her. Don't be so racist, Rutherford! Surprise! It's really her! 🤣🤣🤣 (tbf, they did only know each other for a year, and even then, it wasn't like they knew each other well)

She starts off DAI ruthless and stubborn as hell, aggressively doing the Right Thing and taking everyone along with her. She consolidated as much power as she could, and does everything possible to make the world better for mages and elves, but she's not exactly wise or clever and makes some truly upsetting mistakes. Learning to rely on others, to be vulnerable, and to care more about the small, important details rather than the Big Picture is how she grows. Although she never quite shakes her knee-jerk aggressive and stubborn-jackass personality, she does soften slightly and learn empathy. The Iron Bull's betrayal much later shakes her down to her core, and it's the main reason why she chooses to save and forgive Solas instead of kill him in the end. She doesn't want to let down and lose another close friend like she did the Iron Bull.

[autisticspecialeducator]

Hello, my friend!

I go by Maia or Daisy on the internet. I'm a para-educator who is autistic and a cane user! I mostly use this blog for fun and to post about disability stuff and things that make me happy.

I was born in the USA, but I grew up in Ukraine. I don't post much news, it affects me very badly, but I like posting things about Ukrainian culture and my experience! It's very important to me. I speak Ukrainian and would be happy to speak it with anyone who would like to! I didn't get to engage with the Ukrainian queer community much growing up, так якщо ви частина Українська ЛГБТ-спільнота , будь ласка, не соромтеся писати мені. Будемо друзями!

I'm also have some form of plurality, so headmates will sometimes post. It's mostly me, host, posting on here, but some of the other folks have expressed interest in goofing off on the internet and the system as a whole has decided that it's safe to do so. If there's no sign-off, it's safe to assume it's host!

My Sideblogs

@nonbinary-niki-kinnie is my dsmp blog, host shares it with Techno, one of my headmates.

@kalina-tabrys-blast-radius is for Dragon Age, which is my boyfriend's special interest. I like my boyfriend.

@nonbinary-sam-winchester is for Supernatural. I know, in the year of our Lord etc.

@golden-retriever-gideon is my Locked Tomb blog and I'm ALWAYS on there with correct takes.

@big-brother-parker is where Parker, one of my headmates, hangs out and goofs off. I've been wanting to interact with him from my main so that's why I'm tagging.

And finally, @housebutcharchives is my gender diary, kinda. I post gender labels I relate to and ramble about why. I like that blog, I think it's very cozy.

[cassynite]

OC Tag Game

I was tagged by @dujour13 and @spyridonya for this, thank you both for thinking of me!!

Favorite

PWOTR

This one is so hard...like choosing your favorite child...and also it just tends to be who I'm thinking of the most at that particular moment.

I guess the one I love the most is always going to be my Knight-Commander, Sparrow--captured and sold into slavery at a young age, she became a body double and guard for a Cheliaxian family and goes to Kenabres to try and find escape and freedom.

She is a deeply reserved and quiet individual, keeping her feelings and thoughts close to her chest, and cautious to a fault. But underneath that is someone with deep feeling and passion, an incredibly warm and loving person who is desperately lonely and just wants to find someone who won't leave her, as every person who she has loved has done in the past. She romances Daeran Arendae and they both work through their shit together <3

Newest

The Wayhaven Chronicles

The newest OC is technically still cooking, but he's my latest detective in the IF The Wayhaven Chronicles! His name is Bastian Roche, a nervy little man who would just like everyone to get along, please, and who has a tendency to fail upwards, much to his chagrin. He loves his little town and loves his mama, and is very upset at the recent murders going on and then the supernatural bullshit that ends up crawling out of the woodwork as a consequence.

He's gonna romance Felix and I'm pretty sure is going to be the only detective I've played who doesn't become friends with Adam or Mason by the end of book 2 because he has a spine made of wet tissue paper.

Oldest

Dragon Age: Origins

I might have had older OCs but I don't remember them--the one that still exists in any form would be Dannia Tabris, my canon warden in DAO. She's a daggers rogue, duelist and assassin specialties.

She's the first real Specialist Little Snowflake I ever made, but like in the worst way--I made her as I played the game and headcanoned that while not a mage, she was born a little "closer" to the Fade than others, and because of that she can see the future. This was to accommodate the fact that I always had a game guide open because I hadn't learned that you can't really play an RPG wrong by that point.

Dannia puts up a good front and tends to present herself as funny, warm, and cavalier in front of friends and family, but inside she's a melancholic, vicious, calculating person who is desperate to ensure the safety of people she loves by relying on her frequent visions for guidance.

She lost her mother by ignoring her visions and she refuses to lose anyone else, so of course in the process she does lose everyone--she becomes a Warden and is permanently separated from her family, a vision showing Alistair's execution makes her put him on the throne which he does not want and which ultimately causes the end of their relationship, and she sabotages basically all of her friendships and relationships in general because she sees visions of herself dying to slay the Archdemon.

Then Morrigan comes along, offers the Dark Ritual, and she takes it out of blind hope...and survives. And has to try and live on past her own self-imposed expiration date, now knowing her visions can be false and that her sacrifices up to this point might have been for nothing.

Meanest

PWOTR

I don't really do mean OCs honestly lol. But I'd have to say that the one who is most willing to say mean shit is going to be Kallesto "Vonzi" Voness, my mercenary OC for PWOTR!

Vonzi is an oracle whose patron has given her powers over extreme cold--and, more significantly, powers over time. Vonzi has the ability to time travel, but with a major caveat: jumping back in time forces her to "hold on" to the timeline she creates by changing things, something that takes her very life force. She can either let go, undoing the changes she has made, or die in that time, cementing it as the new reality.

In-game, her main quests revolve around the fact that she is suffering from going back in time to save her family. The KC must either let her die, convince her to let go of the timeline and allow her family to die again, or a Secret Third Thing.

Despite all the shit she goes through, Vonzi is a very confident, very cavalier person. She does not suffer fools lightly and isn't afraid to speak her mind even if it means rocking the boat, and she will tell people what she thinks of them regardless of how unflattering it is. If she likes you, she might be more circumspect, but especially in game she doesn't have the time or energy to be nice. Despite her being a genuinely good person and good friend she puts a lot of people off wit her abrasive attitude.

Softest

Dragon Age Inquisition

Softest OC would have to be Phaedre Lavellan, my canon inquisitor from DAI! Phi is a mage, though not a very well-trained one; when she tells people she was the clan's first, she's lying.

Phaedre like so many other OCs suffered tragedy when she was younger, with her childhood friend and intended--the clan's First at the time--dying to maleficar when Phi, desperate to prove she was grown up enough for vallaslin, goes out on the honorary hunt to earn it and gets in way over her head. The event deeply traumatized her, as it was her fault Ghandriel was out there to begin with. It causes her to retreat from any and all responsibility. Her clan enables this, as she's always been seen as a bit of a baby, and the tragedy causes them to close ranks in an effort to protect her. By 9:40 Dragon, Phaedre is 25 years old and has still not gotten her vallaslin.

News of the Conclave and the spies clan Lavellan plans to send is the last jolt needed from a long-growing feeling of guilt and stasis Phaedre has been in. Sneaking away ahead of the actual spies, Phaedre gets sloppy fake vallaslin from a city elf and joins the Conclave in an effort to prove to herself that she can be useful to her clan and an adult in her own right. And then the Conclave explodes and suddenly she needs to grow up real fast.

Phaedre tends to try to be bubbly and optimistic. She's a little naive but tends to appear even more so because her conflict-averse nature makes her avoid giving out her opinions on anything, which makes it seem like she just doesn't know a whole lot. She's deeply empathetic and emotional, laughs when she's nervous, and wants everyone to be her friend--and it's hard not to be, even when she starts gaining confidence and making decisions that cause disapproval. Phaedre romances Sera.

Most aloof/standoffish

PWOTR

Another non-KC OC, Ophenia Thwait, is going to fit this bill! She's a dhampir that's going to enter her second century soon, and she lost everyone she ever cared about already, including her entire family and her first wife, who she loved more than anything. She wrote books with them as characters to deal with her grief, those books took off, and she spent the next several decades establishing herself as a varied and talented author in several genres. She's currently made a name for herself writing pulp novels of the romance and adventure variety, earning her wild fame and derision in equal measure.

Ophenia keeps all of life at arm's length, looking at it with the clinical mind of a writer that's trying to put together a plot for her next story--because she is. Any character read in an Ophenia Thwait book is based on someone she has met. She considers it the greatest compliment to write using another person, immortalizing them in a story while they age and wither and die. They will at least live forever in her books and the minds of those who read them, but it gives her a tendency to think of people as little more than props for a story that's brewing in her mind, and she will do awful things on purpose just to see what the reaction ends up being or what the consequences are. Gotta get more inspiration, and keep her stories interesting.

Dumbest

PWOTR

Dumbest OC award has to go to Evaethi Arvanxi, Sparrow's "original copy"--the young woman she acted as a body double for! Evaethi means well, mostly, but has learned through a painful childhood that the only real thing she's good at is horses and, later, fighting on them. She fled her noble life of luxury and duty the first real chance she gets, leaving the far more impressive and competent (in her eyes) Sparrow to deal with the aftermath, and joins the Pathfinders, where she will hopefully get some wakeup calls about the way she lives her life. No matter what though, she will never gain the common sense that god gave a goldfish.

Smartest

PWOTR

Isore "Crow" Cygnarus, Sparrow's biological brother who maybe-probably dies in her canon when she was young. I can't even describe how smart he is because "waaaay smarter than me" is about as good as I can get, but he was a savant, a child genius who excelled in mathematics and engineering, who rose to prominence at an astonishingly young age in Alkenstar as an architect and artificer.

He had a lot of ideas, many of which he hoped to spread and see implemented throughout the world--ideas about how society should be run to ensure as little waste, pain, and chaos would be generated, ways that he felt the ills of the world could truly be solved. But before he could do any of that, he had his younger sister with him, who needed to be raised, and he recognized that wandering the world and focusing on your own ambitions was insufficient for rearing a young child. So he settled in the idyllic country of Dehrukani, helping them improve their crystal towers and develop new and interesting ways to store magical energy, and waited for her to grow up right to the point where he is murdered by slavers.

Crow's personality was whatever he needed it to be to get the most out of the people around him--Sparrow remembers him as a kind, patient, perfect older brother, because that's the mask he put on around her. In reality, he was an extremely distant, cold, and ambitious individual. His brilliance came from his natural ability to see things broken down into parts working together as systems, and ultimately that's how he saw people--as parts within the system of society. The closest he ever came to love was the mix of responsibility and interest he had in his little sister.

OC you’d be best friends with IRL

I feel like I would be intimidated by most of my OCs lol. I think I'd get along with Evaethi but would find her self-absorbed nature incredibly grating and honestly she'd be tiring to be around.

The person I'd be best friends with is Vonzi! I'd find her funny and her confidence inspiring.

[lottiesnotebook]

Author Ask Tag

Thank you @hyperions-light for the tag! Their author ask is here (and wow is it exciting to be tagged by such a brilliant writer and community builder. <3) Everyone go read their fic right now if you enjoy brilliant smut with delightfully fucked-up dynamics...

Oh you're back? Great! I'm answering these questions about The Kick Inside (my beloved) given that it's my longest and most ambitious fic to date...

What is the main lesson of your story?

This could be an essay all in itself, but I'll try and keep it relatively short! The Kick Inside is, at heart, a story about the lessons that parents teach their children in order to make them into people who survive, and the points at which those lessons are no longer useful. It's also a story about hope being a weed that grows up out of a crack in the pavement, even when you think there's nothing left in you to hope with.

What did you use as inspiration for your world building?

So as this is a Dragon Age fanfic, I took a lot of inspiration from, well, Dragon Age, particularly the themes of bodily autonomy, sexual violence, and maternity that run throughout Origins that the game doesn't really have the time to handle (thanks especially to the Dragon Age wiki mods, whoever they might be - your work is appreciated!)

Beyond that, I took a lot of inspiration from the brilliant works of T Kingfisher (who I will not tag out of shyness) who's work, both in romance and in horror, and especially in fairytale retellings, always manages to feel incredibly grounded in a real world with real characters, regardless as to how insane their situations are. For The Kick Inside, particularly, my main inspirations were The Seventh Bride (Bluebeard retelling), Nettle and Bone, and all of the World of the White Rat books. Obviously Thedas has some incredible worldbuilding already, but this is the main influence for creating a fairytale-influenced story that (hopefully) feels grounded in something that is, for the characters, incredibly real.

What is your MC trying to achieve, and what are you, the writer, trying to achieve with them? So you want to inspire others, teach forgiveness, or help them grow as a person?

I have two main characters, so I'll answer for both of them!

Luna Tabris is mostly trying to achieve Surviving The Blight by any means necessary, despite the horrors of roadtrips, darkspawn, and pregnancy. What I'm trying to achieve with her is a story about someone who starts their story at a point where they think all hope is lost and the person they used to be is dead, and how hope and living grow back around them despite that.

Morrigan has the harder lesson to learn, because she's the reason this fic is subtitled (in my heart) Dragon Age Rapunzel AU. Encountering another potential vessel for her Dark Ritual Baby shifts her position in Flemeth's plan from the child's biological mother to the Flemeth-like witch who will make a deal to take the baby away, much like Flemeth is implied to have stolen or acquired Morrigan via a similar deal. So what she is trying to achieve is 'get a Dark Ritual Baby without having to be pregnant/have unwanted sex herself', and what she's actually going to learn is a series of increasingly alarming lessons about empathy, bodily autonomy, and the Horrors of Group Projects. Oh, and the Power of Love and Friendship of course

How many chapters is your story going to have?

My outline says 30, but we are WELL off track from that, so probably closer to 40? This fic has ballooned well beyond my control at this point.

When did you start writing?

In my life? Probably when I was about 4, I think my mum still has my First Book somewhere in the house. But I started The Kick Inside in August, and I did NaNo in November to try and get it done and... yeah no I just made it longer.

Do you have any words of encouragement for fellow writers of writeblr?

For longer stories/fics? Perfect is the enemy of done. Sometimes you get stuck on a scene/chapter for ages and the answer is really just to end it and come back later. Usually when I do this and come back, it turns out actually it ended exactly where it needed to.

This was really fun and helpful for me, so tagging @teine-mallaichte, @adainesjacket, @heylavellan to come play too (if you want to!). Oh, and anyone else with a multi-chapter WIP who sees this, just tag me so I see it too!

[cairaleighexe]

Just want to drop in and say I love the way you draw elves! It's always really nice to come across DA fanart where elves have muscle mass, as the first DA character I ever made was a warrior Tabris. I want more elves with a greatsword and a cocky smirk that just says "try me!"

Body vallaslin is another thing I love finding. Because it doesn't have a canon design, it's fascinating to see each artist's interpretation. Not just in terms of design, but also layout.

Thank you so much!! Lowkey highkey gonna ramble in this jfsjfk

I agree! I love seeing elves with different body types, the canon reason for elves' typical build felt more like someone's preferences than something that would make sense so I just ignored it!

Even though Hanan is a double dagger rogue I hc that she is trained in fighting hand-to-hand and with sticks and blades. I also just wanted her to be able to pick someone up and throw them and have it visually make sense in my head.

Nude sketch below the cut!

I drew this reference sketch when I was designing her outfit for the WEWH quest to see how the outfit would sit on her but I also needed a reference for her vallaslin during DAI. Her vallaslin design is based on winding tree branches, Post main game she has her vallaslin expanded to have the more complex mythal design and to include flowers. I also have all her vallaslin on her upper body for character reasons.

[miladysatsuki]

ok my post about talking about 3.0+1.0 kawoshin & kaworus development got a few likes so I’m going to ramble under the cut about mostly kawoshin & kaworu but actually about all of the pilots & the whole movie.

SPOILER WARNING FOR EVANGELION 3.0+1.0 also out of context spoilers for pmmm in the second to last paragraph I’m just comparing the two

So, first of all I’m going to say some general movie thoughts: I liked the movie, I know there are some polarizing opinions. I agree that Asuka and Mari both deserved more development and attention. However Asukas “confession” at the EoE mirrored scene really did not feel romantic to me like it felt very much just accepting that like no I do actually care about you Shinji despite always pushing you away I do want well for you and always have, but I didn’t know how to deal with that truth and my own pain at the same time. Asuka is not tsundere, she does not have romantic feelings for Shinji and never has. I will die on this hill. She may have wanted him to want her to validate herself but, thats a different can of worms.

Mari and Shinji running off together at the end, OBVIOUSLY the implication is they’re together but I feel like they intentionally left it a bit ambiguous for people who didn’t need/want to see Shinji in a romantic relationship. Like they easily could have shown her pregnant or kissing him or something and that would have been very blatant. I think the fact that she is the one who came up to him at the end instead of Asuka Rei or Kaworu is mostly fan service with a dash of letting the other three have room to be their own people separate of Shinji. Rei and Kaworu have never been their own person without their entire worlds revolving around Shinji and I think the visual of the two of them talking together at the end but still on the other side of the train station was a good way of showing like they are still relevant to Shinjis life but they get to explore their own worlds too. Obviously same goes for Asuka because she is the other side of the same coin with Shinji, she deserves to be her own person too. I also like to pretend after running off the train platform together they go to the other side & meet up with the others :)

ANYWAYS MORE ABOUT KAWORU SPECIFICALLY

I think its really interesting that almost every popular fan theory about him got confirmed in this new movie, even ones that had barely any basis in previous movies, and that they also dismissed the main popular homophobic opinion of “he was just using Shinji”. He truly wanted Shinji to be happy, because he wanted that to be enough to make himself happy. & I genuinely think he was aware and fully willing to keep living the loop for Shinji infinitely but Shinji recognizing the loop existing and acknowledging all that Kaworu had done for him already was also extremely releasing. Probably freed him from something he didn’t even know was trapping him at all. Kaji and Kaworus father/son moment was really sweet as well considering Kaworu is his own parents and has never known any kind of family.

I also have read some online takes that Rei and Kaworu are meant to be “together” at the end? but I really dont think standing next to one another constitutes a romantic relationship LOL. They’re definitely still/always siblings in my book. I also would like to think all the pilots kept their memories from the rebuild timeline, Kaworu keeping them from every timeline & Shinji having a blurry understanding of the existence of multiple timelines but not every detail.

I wonder if this implies Kaworu and Rei are fully human, I’m not sure how that works. Maybe he still is Tabris but angels pose no threat without evas anymore so he can just live amongst them like anyone else.

I also wanted to say like PMMM is another one of my dearest animes and something about Shinji pulling the Goddoka card to rewrite the universe without evas (without witches) but Yui facing the burden for him is so sweet. I can’t see it going any better way. Unit 01 obviously was taking as much damage for Shinji all along and her being able to be his final release from that pain is just, I don’t know how it could do any other way. I also don’t think I could handle it if it was exactly the same as PMMM and no one remembered Shinji. Shinji my beautiful baby boy who represents hope for humanity?? Completely forgotten?? thats too much even for me 😩 also this is a side note: I am absolutely in no way a Gendo apologist but I really appreciated him getting his loose ends tied off too, for Shinjis sake mostly. I don’t think Evangelion could have ended without Shinji gaining understanding for his father. Shinji understanding his father is another important aspect of Shinji representing humanity. It probably also allowed him to heal a little from Kaworu being “just like my father” like yeah, we all are, a little bit he’s also just a guy just like you. Gendo is the absolute tail-end of the spectrum of losing your hope and your humanity. The visual of Shinji using the lance of hope and Gendo using despair is obvi a very classic anime trope but I still liked it. Gendo losing Yui and letting it destroy him and Shinji losing Kaworu but using that to move forward and grow and keep Kaworu alive in spirit (also in real life but he didn’t know that at that point obvi). Chefs kiss.

anyways Shinji and Kaworu get a house together and live happily ever after :) idk I haven’t thought much about how they would live on post movie but I feel like the whole group would all be good friends + Toji and fam + Kensuke too of course. I could do a whole nother post about Toji and Kensuke 😫 I have so many feelings for evangelion lmk if u wanna hear LOL

[randomnonsensedragonage]

Answered the same asks for my secondary DA universe!

From left to right: Melia Tabris, Corin Hawke, and Selana Lavellan

Portraits again made in this picrew.

These were fun to answer. I haven't spent quite as much time thinking about these characters, Melia in particular.

your Warden/Hawke/Inquisitor's opinion on Orlais?

Melia: Prior to becoming a Warden she didn’t have much of an opinion on Orlais, because she didn’t know much about it and assumed she would never go there. In her Warden-Commander and, later, searching for the cure to the Calling days, she does spend some time there and is not a fan. It’s too big, the people are too snobby, it’s troublesome to travel through as a lone elf.

Corin: She has a vague dislike for Orlais as a Fereldan. When she eventually gets to go, she finds it to be a mixed bag. The food is good, the landscape is really pretty, she likes the common folk she meets, but she finds the nobles and the politics very tedious.

Selana: She doesn’t like it. She feels out of place and hates the way elves are treated there.

are they skilled in The Grand Game?

Melia: She’s okay. The only time she ever had to play the Game was during her Warden-Commander years, and not often.

Corin: She’s also okay. She’s not great at keeping up with what’s going on in the Game, but because she’s funny and snarky she gets by.

Selana: Selana actually does all right with it because she has a witty sense of humor that serves her well in the Game. But, she hates it.

opinion on blood magic?

Melia: In her younger days, she thinks it’s frightening, but in a vague, abstract way. She’s not a mage and her main experience with blood magic is via scary stories. She encounters more blood magic in her travels, though, and between those experiences and hearing about what happened to the Wardens at Adamant, she grows to hate it.

Corin: She’s wary of blood magic, especially given her experiences in Kirkwall, but since Merrill uses it and she trusts and respects her, she’s willing to give it a chance. She figures it can be a useful tool in the right hands. She has no desire to rush out and try blood magic for herself, though.

Selana: Selana doesn’t have strong opinions on blood magic, not being a mage herself. Similar to Melia, she was raised to see it as scary and bad, so she just accepts that as true. When Solas says that it’s just a tool and isn’t inherently bad, though, she thinks that makes a lot of sense.

attitude towards Andrastianism?

Melia: As a city elf, she was raised Andrastian, but she is ambivalent about it. She always felt like the religion was more for humans and didn’t connect with it.

Corin: She was also raised Andrastian, but she isn’t a religious person. She finds it boring and a bit pointless.

Selana: She feels resentful toward Andrastianism, like most things involving humans.She spent most of her childhood as a city elf, so she was raised Andrastian during that time. Similar to Melia, she didn’t really connect with the religion. After her family was killed by humans, she didn’t have any issue letting it go and taking on Dalish beliefs.

attitude towards the Chantry?

Melia: Not being very religious, she has mixed feelings about it. She’s seen the good the Chantry can do for those in need, but also feels like they don’t do enough when it counts, especially for elves.

Corin: Corin is neutral to negative toward the Chantry. She knows that it’s largely due to the Chantry’s doctrines that she and her family had to hide out all her life, but she also understands it’s important to some people (like Bethany).

Selana: She is pretty anti-establishment thanks to what happened to her family, and the Chantry is no exception there. She feels like all the institutions she grew up with failed her. She knows that the Chantry in particular has often encouraged and frequently turned a blind eye toward elven discrimination, so she can’t really forgive them for that. However, she’s also pragmatic, so as Inquisitor she tries to preserve the Chantry so it won’t collapse and create chaos. She’s not exactly rushing to give them lots of support, though.

attitude towards the Qun?

Melia: Melia does not get the Qun simply because she doesn’t know anything about it. Being from an Alienage, where she didn’t receive the best education, she might not even have heard of it prior to meeting Sten. And again, Sten is like, the worst person to explain the Qun, even if you’re his friend XD

Corin: She doesn’t like it. There’s the whole Qunari-invading-her-city, trying-to-capture-her-girlfriend incident, and the fact that she’s a very free-spirited person. It’s not a good philosophical fit for her.

Selana: She finds the lack of personal freedom under the Qun upsetting. Some of the things Bull tells her about it really disturb her, thought she’s diplomatic about it when talking to him.

if they had to choose one person most important to them, who would that be?

Melia: Probably Alistair, given that he’s her life partner and she’s spending all this time looking for a cure to the calling so they can have more time together.

Corin: Probably Varric. Isabela and her brother are important too, of course, but Varric is the one she’ll drop everything for.

Selana: I guess I’d have to say Solas, in spite of everything. Redeeming him becomes her primary driver for a good decade of her life.

who do they hate the most, and do they have an arch-nemesis?

Melia: Vaughan, easily. Even though he’s dead. I think it would be hard for her to hate anyone more.

Corin: She doesn’t hate easily, so it would certainly be Quentin, her mother’s murderer.

Selana: Corypheus. Her response to him destroying Haven was anger. She wants vengeance.

what is their love language? 

Melia: Receiving gifts

Corin: Words of affirmation

Selana: Acts of service

are they good horse riders?

Melia: She doesn’t get to ride much until she becomes Warden-Commander, but she picks it up quickly thanks to her rogue-ish grace and is pretty good at it.

Corin: No. She’s ridden before thanks to her rural upbringing, but she’s not athletic and has never been comfortable on a horse.

Selana: As a clan Lavellan hunter, Selana sometimes rode harts and halla bareback as part of her work, though not as often as she went on foot. She’s okay at formal horseback riding, but finds it a little awkward and unnatural and would rather be walking.

what are their religious beliefs, if any?

Melia: She’s agnostic. She honestly doesn’t know if the Maker is real or not, and doesn’t think about it much.

Corin: She also doesn’t think about religion much, but in her heart of hearts she is an atheist and doesn’t believe in the Maker or any other gods.

Selana: Basically, she wants to believe the elven gods are real and the Maker isn’t, but she isn’t sure. She never connected with Andrastianism, but she also wasn’t raised Dalish, so it’s hard for her believe in the elven gods because they’re a relatively new concept to her. Once she learns the truth about the Evanuris, she can’t bring herself to follow Dalish religious traditions anymore. But, she also can’t bring herself to go back to Andrastianism because it feels like a betrayal. So, she becomes fully areligious.

attitude towards Mabari?

Melia: She was a bit afraid of Mabari prior to becoming a Warden. Elves typically aren’t allowed to have them, and humans who do have them often use them as guard dogs, sometimes pointed in the direction of Alienage elves. But when she gets her Mabari she loves him immediately, and her attitude toward Mabari overall softens as a result.

Corin: She loves Mabari in general and her family Mabari in particular.

Selana: Selana isn’t too familiar with Mabari because she’s not from Fereldan, but she’s still wary of them and large dogs in general because of her Alienage origins. Meeting Cullen’s Mabari helps her get over her fears a little bit, but she’s still skittish around them.

their thoughts on the Grey Warden order?

Melia: She’s positive about the order overall, because becoming a warden gave her a lot of opportunities. She believes in the good of what they’re doing, while also acknowledging their problems. She is trying to cure the Calling, after all.

Corin: She’s positive about them. They saved Fereldan and her brother, and she’s happy Carver feels more of a purpose being with them.

Selana: Selana was positive-to-neutral on the Grey Wardens prior to her time with the Inquisition. She knew they’d saved Fereldan, and is inclined to trust them because she likes and respect Blackwall. However, when all the Adamant stuff happens she does a 180. It’s a combination of being disgusted by the things the wardens are doing, already being suspicious of institutions, and taking Solas’ negative opinion of them to heart. She ends up banishing them. She still likes individual wardens, like Blackwall and Alistair, she just doesn’t trust the order as a whole and thinks it’s better for them to not be around.

who are they closest to from their family?

Melia: She was closest with her mother before she died, and afterward, closest to Soris. After joining the wardens, Melia and Soris grow apart, and she ends up being closest with Shianni, since they often cross paths through each of their political work.

Corin: She was closest with Bethany before she died. Later in life she’s closest to Carver by default since he’s the only family she has left, but it’s still not as strong a relationship as she had with Bethany.

Selana: Her entire biological family died when she was 14, but prior to their deaths she was closest with her younger brother. Among her adopted clan Lavellan family she’s closet with her hunting band, though there is always a bit of distance due to her not being born Dalish.

preferred weapon of choice?

Melia: Daggers.

Corin: Staff.

Selana: Longbow.

do they get sentimental about their weapons or armour?

Melia: Yes. Before leaving the Alienage, Melia only had access to one set of daggers, so she took good care of them and valued them highly. Upon joining the Wardens she was given a better set. She accepted that this was necessary but was still a bit sad to put her old daggers aside. When she returns to the Alienage, her father gifts her her mother’s old dagger, which she treasures and continues to use as Warden-Commander and on her journeys.

Corin: She’s not sentimental about her staff, but as an apostate her father drilled into her that she had to treat it with care because it’s a hassle to get a new one, so she tries to be careful. That being said, she’s irreparably broken her staves a handful of times throughout her life, and they were, indeed, a huge pain to replace. Things got easier once she was in Kirkwall (because the black market existed) and after the mages rebelled (authorities had more important things to worry about than keeping tabs on the stave black market). She’s still careful out of habit, though.

Selana: A little bit. She mostly just sees her bows as tools, but back with the Dalish she did have to carve them herself, which engenders some sentimentality. She doesn’t have to do that anymore with the Inquisition, though, so there’s not as much attachment.

what were they like as a child?

Melia: She was outgoing, friendly, and fiercely protective of smaller and weaker kids. She would get really angry about injustice, to the point that her parents had to have some serious talks with her about being careful not to say or do things around humans that could put her in danger.

Corin: Even as a kid, she was goofy and liked to joke around, but child Corin was more genuine in her fun seeking. She was also more obedient and eager to please, and joked to lighten the mood and make her family happy. It was only as an adolescent that her humor became more of a way to deal with her frustration about being an apostate and as a way to unsettle those who annoyed her.

Selana: She was a thoughtful and responsible, though cheerful, kid. After her family was killed, she became more quiet, anxious, and pessimistic. It took her awhile to rediscover her cheer and sense of fun, though it would of course never be quite the same.

do they have any irrational fears?

Melia: Her loved ones suddenly forgetting about her.

Corin: Losing the ability to speak.

Selana: Spiders.

are they afraid of death?

Melia: She is, though she’s most afraid of dying young and leaving her loved ones behind.

Corin: Yes. The idea of nonexistence freaks her out.

Selana: Not really. In some ways it seems comforting, because if there is an afterlife maybe she’ll see her family again.

where would they like to be buried?

Melia: She’d like to be buried in the Alienage’s cemetery, since that’s where her mother is.

Corin: She’d like to be buried at sea, since that’s what Isabela will likely do.

Selana: She doesn’t know. She doesn’t really have a home anymore once she leaves her clan.

what is their biggest regret?

Melia: Not being able to get to Shianni in time in Vaughan’s estate.

Corin: Not being able to save Bethany.

Selana: Not being able to prevent the murder of her family.

have they ever been to Tevinter?

Melia: I think she probably goes to Tevinter at some point during her search for the cure.

Corin: Nope.

Selana: As of the start of Veilguard, probably not.

do they have, or want to have, children?

Melia: She kind of wants to have children, but doesn’t think she ever will given how crazy her and Alistair’s lives are. She holds out hope that this might be a possibility if she finds a cure for the calling sooner rather than later.

Corin: She doesn’t want to have children.

Selana: She would have children if her partner wanted to, but is also fine with not having them.

what languages can they speak?

Melia: Common only.

Corin: Common only.

Selana: Common and a very small amount of Elven.

what did they plan for their life to look like before the events of the game happened?

Melia: She assumed she would get married, have kids, and stay in the Alienage all her life, though she hoped she’d also find a way to make some sort of difference for her people and use her fighting skills.

Corin: She didn’t have many plans. She figured she would have to stay with her family due to not having a lot of options as an apostate, though she often dreamed of striking out on her own and becoming a mercenary or something.

Selana: She just imagined herself staying with clan Lavellan as a hunter, and maybe marrying another Dalish elf and starting a family.

do they get a happy ending?

Melia: Yes, until Alistair gets left in the Fade :( But maybe he’ll get out, eh, Bioware??

Corin: Yes, overall. She finds love with Isabela, and her brother and friends are all still alive.

Selana: Nope. She romanced Solas, and becomes a little paranoid leading the Inquistion (which she doesn’t disband). So, not great. For now.

I went into a fugue state and answered all of those canon worldstate asks for my primary DA characters (from left to right: Rora Surana, Ilora Hawke, and Aylwen Lavellan)

Portraits made in this picrew. I might do this again for my second favorite universe in a bit lol

Answers under the cut.

your Warden/Hawke/Inquisitor's opinion on Orlais?

Rora: Mixed. She’d like to visit someday, but also knows from her reading that it’s not the best place for elves.

Ilora: Like any self-respecting Fereldan, she’s not a fan.

Aylwen: She’s a romantic and a history nerd, so she likes Orlais overall. She’s very aware of its flaws, though.

are they skilled in The Grand Game?

Rora: She’s never had to try, but she wouldn’t be great at it. She’s too self-conscious and honest in her dealings.

Ilora: She’s also never had to try, and also wouldn’t be good at it. She has no patience for that kind of thing.

Aylwen: Not really. She’s too straightforward to truly be good at the game. She does manage to do okay at the winter palace, mainly by being friendly, going along with things, and underplaying her intelligence in a way that lulls the nobles into a false sense of security.

opinion on blood magic?

Rora: Having grown up in the Circle, she fully believes that blood magic is evil. Jowan’s betrayal only convinces her further of that.

Ilora: She hates it, thanks to her experiences in Kirkwall.

Aylwen: Unlike the other two, she doesn’t have any direct experience with blood magic. She’s wary of it, but doesn’t think it’s inherently evil. She’s pretty convinced by Solas’ argument that it’s just another form of magic. She would be wary of using it herself, though.

attitude towards Andrastianism?

Rora: Rora was raised Andrastian, first in the Alienage and then in the Circle, but she’s not particularly attached to the religion.

Ilora: She considers herself culturally Andrastian, but like Rora doesn’t have strong feelings about it. She’s more likely to be observant or pray when things are going wrong or in moments of stress, figuring it can’t hurt to be devout at times like that.

Aylwen: Aylwen is proudly Dalish and proudly worships Dalish gods, so her attitude towards Andrastianism is one of frustration. Especially being the Herald, she gets very tired of being viewed as a figurehead for a religion she isn’t part of, and which has historically persecuted her people. Her attitude softens a bit when she gets together with Cullen, because she sees how important it is to him. She has no interest in converting to or practicing Andrastianism, though, because she feels like that would be a betrayal of who she is.

attitude towards the Chantry?

Rora: Prior to leaving the Circle, she just saw the Chantry as a fact of life, and necessary for everyone's protection. For her own safety and peace of mind as a Circle mage, she couldn’t afford to think too deeply about it. After she joins the Wardens, she realizes that her views about the Chantry are more negative than she realized, and that she resents the control they have over mages. Meeting more ardently religious folks like Leliana and Wynne also puts her own views into perspective. She knows that she doesn’t have that depth of faithl.

Ilora: Ilora is basically neutral toward the Chantry. Because she grew up with two apostates in her family, she’s skeptical of all large institutions. But, because she was brought up Andrastian and Bethany is pretty religious, she can also see the value in it. 

Aylwen: Aylwen is skeptical of the Chantry. As a Dalish elf, she’s well aware of the harm the Chantry can cause and wouldn’t mind seeing it collapse. She comes to see the value of the Chantry a bit more via working with the Inquisition. She appreciates that it means a lot to a lot of people, and that the Chantry collapsing would probably do more harm than good. She still thinks it needs major reforms, though.

attitude towards the Qun?

Rora: She super doesn’t understand it. There aren’t a lot of written resources about the Qun available to her, and Sten is not good at explaining it. She comes to understand it a biiit better through her friendship with Sten, but barely.

Ilora: Given that the Qunari occupied the city she was living in, she is not a fan. She did her best to be understanding and diplomatic with the Arishok, but as we know that didn’t turn out well. She also doesn’t like the way they treat mages.

Aylwen: Most of what Aylwen knows about the Qun comes from Iron Bull. Because he’s her friend, she tries to be understanding about it and keep an open mind. In truth, though, what she does learn makes her uneasy.

if they had to choose one person most important to them, who would that be?

Rora: Not to be cliché by choosing her LI, but Alistair. Being a Circle mage whose best friend betrayed her, she doesn’t really have anyone else. She and Alistair trauma bonded as friends big time after Ostagar, and then fell in love. He’s her best friend, her boyfriend, and her family all rolled into one.

Ilora: Bethany. Ilora would do anything for her sister and keeping her safe is her biggest priority, whether she likes it or not (see: making her a Grey Warden to save her life).

Aylwen: Not to be basic again, but Cullen. Because she leaves her clan behind, and is estranged from them for a bit, he becomes her sole family for a time. She’s also just crazy about him and is happiest when they’re together.

who do they hate the most, and do they have an arch-nemesis?

Rora: She doesn’t really hate anyone, per se. Even her enemies, like Loghain, are more enemies out of necessity than out of hatred.

Ilora: Quentin, the guy who killed her mom. Nominally her archenemy is Meredith, but she doesn’t exactly hate her. More finds her frustrating and thinks she’s misguided and dangerous.

Aylwen: Probably Corypheus, though she fears him more than she hates him. In general, she doesn’t hate specific people so much as larger forces and abstract concepts, like prejudice and religious zealotry.

what is their love language? 

Rora: Quality time

Ilora: Acts of service

Aylwen: Physical touch

are they good horse riders?

Rora: She’s only ridden a horse like twice in her entire life, and she’s afraid of most animals. So, no.

Ilora: She’s decent. She grew up in rural areas, so she got the opportunity to ride horses fairly often.

Aylwen: She’s okay. Back with her clan she would sometimes ride Halla or Harts bareback. Learning to do more formal riding on a horse with a saddle and bridle took some adjustment. She gets better and more comfortable over time since she has to do it so much with the Inquisition. She also likes horses, so that helps.

what are their religious beliefs, if any?

Rora: She’s agnostic. She’s a pretty logical person who does a lot of reading about history and the world at large, and based on what she’s learned she thinks there’s a distinct possibility that there is no Maker. She wouldn’t admit this to most people, though, especially back in the Circle.

Ilora: She believes in the Maker, but she hasn’t thought very deeply about it.

Aylwen: She believes in the elven gods as described in Dalish legends, up until she learns the truth about them during Trespasser. Even then, though, she continues to practice Dalish religious traditions for emotional and cultural reasons.

attitude towards Mabari?

Rora: Having grown up first in an Alienage and then in the Circle, she’s not used to animals and is afraid of them. That includes Mabari, especially since they’re very large dogs. The exception is *her* Mabari, who she has a strong bond with.

Ilora: She loves them, like any self-respecting Fereldan. She doesn’t have one of her own because I didn’t have that dlc during her playthrough but wishes she did.

Aylwen: Aylwen likes animals in general, and that includes Mabari. She’s also a dog person, and Mabari are just big, extra-smart dogs, so what’s not to like?

their thoughts on the Grey Warden order?

Rora: She has mixed feelings. Joining the Grey Wardens kept her out of mage prison, allowed her to meet Alistair and her other friends, and got her out of the Circle, which she really needed. Plus, Alistair loves the Grey Wardens, which makes her want to love them as well. But, she’s not happy about having no choice in joining, or about all the secrets they’ve been keeping.

Ilora: She likes the Grey Wardens, because they saved Fereldan and her sister. She feels like she owes them a lot.

Aylwen: She also likes the Grey Wardens, though she has no direct experience with the order until meeting Blackwall. Or I should I say, she still doesn't. Zing. She knows they saved Fereldan from the Fifth Blight, she enjoys the legends about them, and views them as heroes. Even with the events at Adamant, she views the Grey Wardens as having been manipulated by bad actors, and is more than willing to give them another chance.

who are they closest to from their family?

Rora: Her mom, which is pretty sad because even before she was taken to the Circle she hardly saw her mom, who worked all the time. Her mom also passed away several years into her time at the Circle, so she never saw her again after she was brought there.

Ilora: Bethany, which is also pretty sad since their relationship becomes strained after Bethany joins the Grey Wardens.

Aylwen: She hasn’t seen her birth family since she was four, so clan Lavellan is basically the family that raised her. Among the clan, she’s closest to Keeper Deshanna, which makes sense since Deshanna was her mentor and raised her most directly.

preferred weapon of choice?

Rora: Staff.

Ilora: Knives.

Aylwen: Staff.

do they get sentimental about their weapons or armour?

Rora: Not really. She’s always used the weapons and armor she was told to use, first in the Circle and then as a Grey Warden.

Ilora: She’s sentimental about her knives, since they were gifted to her by her dad before he died.

Aylwen: She was sentimental about her staff, which she crafted and enchanted herself as part of her First training, but it got destroyed in the Conclave explosion. The Inquisition gave her a new one, but it was never quite the same.

what were they like as a child?

Rora: Before going to the Circle, she was quiet, anxious, and imaginative. She didn’t fit in with the other kids in the Alienage, and her grandmother—her primary caretaker—was hard on her. She was a sensitive kid who had a lot of fears and cried a lot, which made her an even easier target. So, she mostly kept to herself and spent a lot of time playing pretend and daydreaming. When she got to the Circle, at age six, she developed more confidence since she was finally good at something and around people she had something in common with. She became much more cheerful and chatty, and stayed that way until she hit adolescence and her anxiety got bad again.

Ilora: She was well-behaved and responsible, a typical eldest child. She spent a lot of time mothering Bethany and Carver, much to the latter’s annoyance. She also had a lot of internalized anxiety because she felt so responsible for her family's safety and well-being.

Aylwen: She was a handful. She was friendly, adventurous, high energy, and always getting into trouble. She was kind of a ringleader among the Alienage kids, and would come up with schemes and games that would get them into trouble as well. She’s always been curious about other cultures, so she would do dangerous things like sneak off to local human villages to poke around, much to Deshanna’s unhappiness.

do they have any irrational fears?

Rora: Animals, thanks to not having much experience with them.

Ilora: The dark.

Aylwen: Spiders.

are they afraid of death?

Rora: Yes, but like a lot of things she avoids thinking about it.

Ilora: Yes, the normal amount.

Aylwen: Yes, but she accepts that it’s a part of life.

where would they like to be buried?

Rora: She’s never thought about it. She always assumed she’d be buried at the Circle, and after she has to leave she doesn’t have a place she thinks of as home where it would make sense for her to be buried.

Ilora: Either in Lothering, near where her dad is buried, or in Kirkwall, near where her mom is buried.

Aylwen: In the South Reach, along with Cullen, or in her clan’s territory in the Free Marches.

what is their biggest regret?

Rora: Not getting to say goodbye to her mom when she was taken to the Circle.

Ilora: Not being able to save Carver.

Aylwen: Not being able to save everyone when Haven was attacked.

have they ever been to Tevinter?

Rora: Nope.

Ilora: Nope.

Aylwen: We’ll see in DAV, won’t we?! I don’t think she’s been there pre-DAV, though.

do they have, or want to have, children?

Rora: She’s never really thought about it, because she always assumed she wouldn’t be allowed to, and she dies when she’s only 20. But had she lived, she would have wanted to have children with Alistair.

Ilora: She would have children if her partner wanted to. She likes kids and has those motherly mom-friend instincts. But it’s not a priority for her, and she ends up lost in the Fade so it’s a moot point. For now.

Aylwen: She’s always wanted to have children. I haven't decided yet, but by the time of DAV she and Cullen will either have at least one small kid (age 4 max), or be getting ready to have kids soon.

what languages can they speak?

Rora: Only common, but she can read a little Alamarri (she was bored in the library one day and memorized some old poems).

Ilora: Only common.

Aylwen: Common and a little Elvish.

what did they plan for their life to look like before the events of the game happened?

Rora: She figured she would become an Enchanter, join one of the fraternities (Aequitarians, probably), take on some students, and hopefully do well enough to be assigned duties as a healer or alchemist outside the Circle.

Ilora: She didn’t think too hard about it because she was so concerned with keeping her sister from being caught by the Templars. She assumed she’d continue to look out for her family, go wherever they needed to go to be safe, and take on mercenary work to support them.

Aylwen: She planned to stay with her clan, continue her training with Deshanna, and eventually become Keeper.

do they get a happy ending?

Rora: No, she dies killing the Archdemon. But maybe she’ll get resurrected somehow? Please, Bioware.

Ilora: No, everyone she loves dies or leaves her (except Varric, of course), and she gets left in the Fade. But fingers crossed she gets out. Please, Bioware.

Aylwen: Yes for now. She settles down with Cullen, dissolves the Inquisition, and eventually reconciles with Deshanna despite marrying a human.