#falondin05

[felassan]

I was responding to an ask and tumblr ate it. 😔 but it was something like:

falondin05 said: hello! all's well? I hope so. I would like to know if you think new races will be introduced in DA:D (not to be playable but just to add to the already vast lore of DA). For example, the Scaled Ones mentioned in The Descent. A reptilian race that lives underground. Or the Executors... are they another race? what do you think?  

hello! I'm well thanku, same to you ◕‿◕ I could definitely see a world where a new mysterious group like this, rather than being actually seen by us in-game is mentioned in a codex entry somewhere or something, it's happened before. it would also be neat to learn a bit more about the existing ones. like what's the deal with the Scaled Ones, and who are the Fex who are rarely seen outside of Par Vollen? what about the Parladian nation and the Voshai with their ships captained by dwarves? the lore is vast like you say and there's a lot of interesting threads and enigmatic factions.

given the appearance of one in Tevinter Nights and what their role in the last story there was, their interest in and knowledge of the Dread Wolf's plans etc, I rly hope we meet an Executor or two in the game and find out more about them!! (๑*ᗜ*) my crack theory about the Executors since reading TN (smell of the sea..) the first time is that they were made by or are otherwise connected to Ghilan'nain. (prepared to be hilariously wrong though & excited to find out more regardless). my other thought some time ago was wondering if they were connected to the 'triangle people' faction (because.. triangles), but since we learned that the 'triangle people' are Veil Jumpers, I'm not sure how likely I'd guess that to be anymore.

[felassan]

Do you think that DA4 (or future games) can present different plans and realities besides the physical world and the Fade already known? In Tevinter Nights Dorian recalls a story he heard about creatures that are beyond the veil. Could they come from a different place? The Void for example? And what do you think of Thedas owning an underwater kingdom \ nation \ empire (like Atlantida) ?

Hello! This answer is under a cut due to length.

I think it’s possible, it feels like that’s what was being hinted towards in Luck in the Gardens in Tevinter Nights:

He looked pensive. “I was at a party with one of those necromancers from down south a while ago. Five cups in, she went on about things ‘past the Veil of our world,’ neither demon nor spirit. Perhaps it wasn’t the tipsy nonsense I assumed it to be.”

“Past the Veil of our world” could either mean in the Fade (which is on the other side of the Veil to the mundane world), the Void and/or* a different plane/dimension. The cekorax had eldritch abomination, illithid, Lovecraftian-vibes (which is to say, being-from-another-plane vibes). Perhaps it came from some frightening part of the Deepest Fade, but the Void feels like a great candidate for its place of origin, and when I read it I got the sense that it came from someplace other than the Fade itself. Other dimensions and planes isn’t an out-there thing in the lore either; the Crossroads is only one of the “places [in]between” and is a separate place beyond both the Fade and the mundane world, and the ancient elves were able to use their magic to create such pockets with their own rules of reality, from the very fabric of space and time. The time angle also reminds me of the alternate reality future we saw at Redcliffe and the time magic involved in In Hushed Whispers.

I’d be on-board with it being a thing in the next game too as the concept is so interesting. Wouldn’t it be cool? Something like the Wood Between the Worlds in The Chronicles of Narnia, only instead of ponds it’s eluvians which are the portals to different places.

When it comes to Atlantis and Thedas I’m always reminded of what is thought in-world to have happened to Arlathan! - “Arlathan fell so deep onto the ocean floor”, and the Tevinter history which says that the ancient magisters used magic to force the ground to swallow Arlathan whole. There’s also the mystery of the Executors... where do they live, why did the one we’ve encountered take such great pains to conceal its appearance, and why do they smell so strongly of the sea? “Those across the sea”, the wavy line sigil... There’s lots of things that they could be, but I can’t say that I’ve never wondered if they’re like, a race of sea-people lol. The “waters of the Fade” / Fade as the “sea of dreams”-stuff hints though that “water/sea” isn’t always literal but a metaphor/way of describing the Fade (or its essence?), so that loops back around to 1) the place Arlathan was ‘sent’ to is somewhere in the Fade i.e. it’s the Black/Golden City and 2) entities which are neither spirit nor demon (Executors don’t seem like either of these things) coming from the Fade or beyond it, and now my head hurts. :D

*and/or here because it’s not clear what or where exactly the Void is 

[felassan]

falondin05 submitted: What would your DA4 party be like if you could set it up?

Mine would be something like this:

Warriors: Lady Qunari Tal-Vashot (Bellara?), Former Elf slave (Fenris or some new companion) or Dwarf Kal-Sharok, Imperial Human Templar. Rogues: Gray Warden (Davrin?), Antiva Crow (lady crow from concept arts), Companion that returns (Harding). Mages: Magister \ Altus \ Pró-Tevinter (Maeveris or Calpernia or Francesca), Mortalitasi Nevarran (Magical skeleton of concept art \ Audric?), Ancient elf (preferably an arcane warrior) or Saarebas. What do you think ? it’s nice ? what would change? how would yours be?

Hello! This is a really fun question, thankyou. I like your setup: I like Harding, I’m definitely interested in the idea of having Lady Qunari, Crow Lady and Skellington from the concept art we’ve seen as companions, and an ancient elf who is helping try to stop the Dread Wolf has great story potential imo.

If I could choose, bearing in mind this is proper wishlist territory for me personally rather than an attempted prediction, and that I know this isn’t a complete roster, it would look like this:

Lady qunari, wlw

Lady dwarf, ideally from Kal-Sharok (first choice) or who is involved with the Ambassadoria (second choice)

Maevaris Tilani

A non-mage modern elf who is for modern elves, and who led, leads or is otherwise connected to an elf or an elf and slave uprising/rebellion in the north. Iorveth-y almost, but any gender

Felassan, having managed to survive somehow. If not Felassan a different ancient elf or someone like Strife would be cool to have though

Someone who is non-binary or similar, can overlap with another point on this list or not (doesn’t matter)

A diverse roster in general

No party members who were proper companions in a previous main game (including Awakening)

[free spots for the others to fill it out, I don’t have further strong preferences really though a Rivaini Seer, a Mortalitasi and a Fog Warrior/Dancer would be very cool, and I’m always interested in concepts which are new/fresh and interesting or even unique]

[felassan]

Faced with the latest events and revelations in Dragon Age (TN, Comics, DAI, Traspasser e etc), do you think there is a possibility that Evanuris appear in DA4? Or did they work only in the imaginary?

Hello! The big question... Cut for length. A bit of repetition in places, pardon me.

In Trespasser the Inquisitor asks Solas, “[if you did that] Wouldn't the false gods be free?” He says “I had plans.” When you consider Solas’ track record with his plans, that they’ve worked but not quite how he expected or he has a certain intention but something unfortunately goes amiss in the process - if he succeeds in his plan to remove the Veil, which some lore hints that he will (Sandal’s prophecy and so forth), it’s a definite possibility.

I have to wonder what his plans entail - has he sorted out a new prison for them, or has he discovered some means of permadeathing them? “The first of my people do not die so easily”, Mythal endured after her murder, etc. It’s true that before the Veil was erected, elves didn’t age, but they could be wounded and die, and elven society then still had a clear concept of immortals (the Evanuris) vs mortals (regular Joe elves): “Fen'Harel has been falsely named a god, but is as mortal as any of you. He takes no divine mantle and asks that none be bestowed upon him”; “This is... Fen'Harel helping former slaves as a mortal. Not a god”; “This claims the elven "gods" were just "Evanuris" - powerful but completely mortal mages. If that's true, Fen'Harel was teaching these freed slaves the truth about these "false gods"”; “One day Andruil grew tired of hunting mortal men and beasts” (Although that one could refer to humans?); “The gods, our Evanuris, claim divinity, yet they are naught but mortals powerful in magic who can die as you can.” There are several takeaways from these quotes:

Before encountering the other races which have their own biology and definitions, the elven definition of “mortal” meant “doesn’t age, but can get wounded and die”, not “doesn’t age, can’t die/can’t perma-die”. Human, Qunari and dwarf (and now modern elf) “mortality” obviously also includes the aging component along with the dying.

I would guess that the difference between the Evanuris and regular ancient elves in terms of this mortality is that if a regular elf got wounded and died, they stayed dead, but if the Evanuris died, they just came back. That would be part of why you couldn’t just rise up and overthrow them; if you killed them, they’d just come back and kill you or get back on their throne. Horcrux shit, possession, regenerating like some spirits essentially can if the conditions are right (consider the potential links between elves and spirits), their souls just jumping to the next body like how Old God souls in Archdemons usually just jump to the next darkspawn if ‘killed’... whatever the explanation. Solas describes this as "effective immortality" when he's talking about how he didn't foresee Corypheus gaining the ability: "I did not expect a Tevinter Magister to discover the secret of effective immortality". The way he says that it's like he's saying "[tired voice] Bruh, how did this guy figure out how to do what the Evanuris can do?"

Even the Evanuris weren’t truly immortal. That was their claim to divinity to be sure, presumably based on some ability to avoid-permadeath they somehow had or somehow acquired [?]

Anyway, the risk of them returning to the world could be part of why a PC might believe they should try to stop Solas. We’ve never encountered most of the Evanuris directly, but if what we’ve learned about them from DAI onwards is anything to go by (bearing in mind that the stuff revealed about them in DA:I could also be intentionally mis-leading or only partially true of course), by the peak of their rule at least they were far from Benign and Benevolent, and that was before they were subjected to an “eternity of torment”. What if they’ve gone mad after millennia of imprisoned torture? What if the place they were imprisoned is the source of the Blight, or a Tainted place like the Black City, or a place like the Void which caused Andruil to suffer periods of intense madness? What if when they get out they want revenge on Fen’Harel for imprisoning them, or to rule over the elven people once more, or to restore their old Empire and systems? What if they want to destroy the Qunari and the human and dwarven kingdoms, or to resume their inter-group conflicts with one another, or to make all of Thedas bend the knee to them as gods as Corypheus did? What if Mythal resurfaces to finally exact revenge on them for her murder, which has always been her goal? Can you imagine a group of maddened possibly-Tainted warring immortal god-kings who are all powerful mages that can turn into dragons hell-bent on any of that stuff roaming the land again? worrying for the little people caught in the crossfire, and about collateral damage.

“As the world burn[s] in the raw chaos” potentially refers to any number of things from a list of possibilities; the chaos of two worlds essentially re-colliding once more, chaos among the populace as the state of reality that they’re used to suddenly dramatically alters, power vacuums arising in the event of casualties of those in leadership positions, possible physical changes to the landscape as fallen pieces start to float again, suddenly spirits and demons share the world with people and all elves are mages, the aftermath of an initial big explosion, etc. Unleashed Evanuris could also contribute to that chaos.

If Whispers Written in Red Lyrium is about them (may not be), it’s ominous:

We are here

We have waited

We have slept

We are sundered

We are crippled

We are polluted

We endure

We wait

We have found the dreams again

We will awaken

I’ve wondered before if the line “Dalish father roams, will the Dalish son survive the fight?” from Maryden’s Trespasser bard song could refer to Elgar’nan as the “father”, rather than Solas:

Then I wondered why it says “Dalish” specifically.. Maybe to make it explicit that it’s in reference to modern elves, or maybe because whatever is to come will specifically affect Dalish elves the most? Solas isn’t the only ancient elf, and a side effect of his plan may be lettting the trapped Evanuris back into the world. He says he has a plan to deal with that, and maybe it will work, but what if it doesn’t? He’s failed in his plans before, and if Flemythal is still around (likely imo) and wants to get her vengeance on the Evanuris for killing her (as I think), they need to be not-imprisoned in order for her to access them to be able to do that. The Evanuris loosed upon the world again - what if it’s the Dalish All-Father doing the roaming? after he killed his wife back in the day?

Elgar’nan once again free and walking the earth, Elgar’nan with his [apparently] ferocious temper and destructive fury, Elgar’nan who’s said to wield fire and lightning. If he’s mad about having being locked up, and if he seeks to reclaim his former power and place of rule - what if the Dalish “son” is modern elves caught up between wrathful warring gods (and those who oppose them)? In Trespasser Solas says he sought to free his people from the Evanuris, who were respected generals that became kings and finally gods. some of the modern elves would refuse to be under such a rule of god-kings again. (Never Again Shall We Submit.) There’s also a fan theory that vallaslin imparted some measure of control of the wearer (or perhaps more like a compulsion to serve, like a geas?) through blood magic or something similar. Dalish now wear vallaslin for different reasons, and the application process may not be the same as it used to be, but there’s a theory that vallaslin-wearers might still be susceptible to unleashed-Evanuris-control. I don’t know about that really, but it’s not a nice image. also, would the patriarch god-king of Arlathan, which iirc once stretched across all of known Thedas as we know it, be content with reclaiming his former rule just over one part or people in Thedas? probably not. At any rate, the idea of facing off against Elgar’nan/some of the Evanuris in a future game.. in this purely hypothetical scenario they’d constitute the “overarching big bad” like the Fifth Blight/Archdemon for the HoF, and Solas would be a secondary antagonist/’false flag villain’ that you can either kill on your way (or something) or in the process get him on your side/redeem (Loghain)/work with him. elgar’nan, fite me (ง’̀-‘́)ง

[Leliana voice] Pure speculation!

yea.. and ok i really wanna meet and do battle with Elgar’nan..

There’s also the line of thinking that instead of the true Big Bad or the final boss, Solas is The Dragon to something else, possibly the Evanuris. Not in a “right hand man or he’s on their side” kind of way, but like how Loghain was a secondary antagonist in DAO, and after dealing with him - or getting him on our side - we then had to deal with the true threat, which was the Fifth Blight and the Archdemon. (Maybe there’s a more suitable trope to label this as, if anyone reading knows what it is, let me know.)

Tevinter Nights hints some more at the Evanuris as potential threats and reminds us of both their existence and their past and powers with The Horror of Hormak. “[in the vicinity of Ghilan’nain shit] Feels like... like the air hates me. Wants me to die.” “[of someone affected by Ghilan’nain shit] She’s raving mad.” “[said mad victim] Oh, yes - we know better. They taught us, gave us a lesson. We went too far. Too deep. Something’s down there, something bad. We thought it was darkspawn, but it’s worse. Because it’s different, you see? Not the same at all. Not twisted but made - created. Three died. They were lucky, I wasn’t. Escaped. But not really. Don’t make me go back. Not there, not where they are. I will not. I cannot. We must leave. This place to her, to them! They build it for her! They wait for her! I am free - I paid the price! [screams in terror and laughs humorlessly]” Waiting for her (Ghilan’nain) implies that ‘she’ will return. “[another victim] I stayed me, and it hates that. [the monster-side begins to take over, insistent] And we waited for you! Oh, yes! Now you come. [screams and the human-side fights back] Can’t let this out. Got to... bury it. Bury me. She cannot have it. Not again. Locked for a reason.” The storybeat potential is thrilling, but yeah, Thedas should be afraid

Gameplay-wise I’d really like to see the Evanuris’ character designs, and fighting them or some of them would be wild. My Inquisitor doesn’t want the false-gods returned to the world, but she’d quite like to punch Elgar’nan a Word.

[felassan]

Would you like us to have more options for weapons and mechanics in combat in DA4? I imagine it would be cool to use katanas, spears, cross-bows, whips and so on. I also think it would be cool to be able to use any type of weapon (except staff for obvious reasons) in any class (with attributes as a basic prerequisite).

Hello! It would definitely be cool to have more choice in weapons and some new combat mechanics. Crow Lady with her rapier and the recent magic bows could potentially indicate something along those lines. In Arlathan, when everyone had magic, the role of a ‘mage’ on the battlefield was probably less defined than it is now, and arcane warriors for instance channeled their magical power through their weapons. What if the people with the gold triangle bows are arcane archers...? The light the bows make is even Fade-green.

I miss dual-wielding warriors and crossbows like we had in DAO, so if they brought stuff like that back that would be neat. I’d also like to see polearms like halberds and spears introduced. Meanwhile in Tevinter Nights Irian Cestes is a non-mage staff-fighter, which is really badass. And with the legionnaires, centurions and the Grand Proving Arena and stuff, maybe they could take a look at things like Roman soldiers and gladiators for some inspiration.

Edit: Oooh, and the assassin “retractable daggers from up the sleevers” (read: AC hidden blades but in DA) that a Crow had in TN, for rogues! pls

[felassan]

Hello, first of all I apologize for my English (he is very bad, laughs). In view of some revelations obtained at the Tevinter Nights, I believe that there is a wide variety of fauna in Thedas. We have the terrifying revelations from Ghillanain's lab and we have Cekorax in Hollix's tale. Given that, do you believe that we can have a wide variety of monsters in DA4? Creatures that inhabit other planes maybe (Void?). Or red lyrium versions of broodmothers (as well as their elven or qunari versions)

Hello, it’s okay, don’t worry about it. 😊 There is indeed, and yes for sure! If Mark Darrah’s Red Book is anything to go by, one of their aims for DA4 is to “feature [their] widest and most varied set of creatures to date”. They picked up on this with all the creatures and monsters in the behind-the-scenes vid (Spider With Hands!) and the comment in it on original flora and fauna, and it’s also been coming through in tweets from the Creature Design team. Tevinter Nights also leans quite hard into it. This monster (version two) has been theorized to connect to Ghilan’nain’s work. This has been theorized to be a red lyrium darkspawn or a red lyrium undead, and all the red lyrium in the promotional material so far sure is ominous. The Cekorax feels Lovecraftian and there are hints that there are creatures/entities coming ‘in’ from “past the Veil of our world, neither demon nor spirit” - that sounds like creatures from the Void and/or from other planes or dimensions. I’m scared and hyped. 😃

[felassan]

Hello, I'm loving interacting with this page about dragon age (so I'm sorry if I send a lot of questions haha). I would like to know if you think that we will ever (on DA4 or later) visit golden city / black city ? Do you think we will have more revelations and discoveries about this fascinating location? What do you think she is?

Hello, that’s great, and don’t worry ◕‿◕ This answer is under a cut as it’s a bit disjointed.

I’d reaaally like to go to the Black / Golden City at some point.. it’s the heart of heaven and at the center of the Fade, it sounds so cool, and it also seems like it’s the ‘nexus’ of several important lore secrets/revelations. Zevran’s romanced goodbye seeded the idea (“For a chance to be by your side I would storm the Black City itself.”) and then Corypheus’ lines in Legacy and DAI make me jealous of him (lol) for having seen it:

We sought the golden light. [...] But it was.. black.. corrupt. Darkness... ever since. How long?

I have seen the throne of the gods, and it was empty!

I’ve wondered if there’s a link between it and Arlathan, and also if it’s the place where the Evanuris are imprisoned (Elvhenan was the empire and Arlathan its greatest city). Since that post was written, it’s now known that Eleni’s prophecy doesn’t refer to Fen’Harel and most likely was just intended to sound vaguely mysterious, like for flavor (i.e. not everything has a ~grand meaning~ and at the time of its writing it didn’t mean anything really) - the speculation about Arlathan, the Black City and the prison and stuff is still fair enough to make though I think, owing to things like the elven belief that their gods were trapped in the Eternal City at the heart of the Fade. I also think the popular theory that the seven gates of the Black City (which Drakon said would one day shatter and then both the spirit and mortal realms would become covered in darkness) are connected to the seven Old Gods is on-point (if the sleeping Old Gods are essentially seals no wonder Solas is angry with the Wardens for trying to seek them out and destroy them).

I could see them taking us to the Black City where we’d make some Discoveries, while leaving some questions like the nature/existence of the Maker unanswered (would like to know that, though, for parity). It would make an awesome setting for a Final Battle. I also think that, given the nature of the place and its ‘position’ in the lore, going to the Black City would be something best kept for the last entry to the series, whichever that will be. That said it makes sense as a location for DA4 - since Solas plans to take down the Veil, inadvertently causing the release of the trapped Evanuris, it would be logical for the place where they’re imprisoned to somehow feature.

[felassan]

What do you think the elven gods (both Evanuris and forgotten ones) will look like in future games? A more normal appearance like Solas? Or a more deformed appearance like that of Corypheus and Architect?

Hello! I think it would be cool if the Evanuris, after being trapped for so long in a place that might conceivably be Tainted and/or red lyrium-y (Black City and/or the Void/Abyss) and then released, have now come to look like something you’d find in the center of the Venn diagram between DA2 & DAI Flemythal (draconic elements), living mortals who have been infected by the Taint (see ghouls and Wesley Vallen when he’s dying for example), the Architect and DAI Corypheus - only elven, obviously. I think about how shrieks are the product of elven broodmothers, and about Andruil’s armor that was made of the Void and how that sounds similar to how red lyrium grows on and affects people like the red Templars (and how parts of their flesh become fused to their armor).

As for the Forgotten Ones, who knows? They could have been anything - a rival faction of gods (would-be gods more like, those opposed to the idea of ‘gods’; so like, the Evnauris’ opponents in the war that winning raised them to god-king status) to the Evanuris in the time of Elvhenan, compatriots of Solas’ during his rebellion, denizens of the Void/Abyss, spirit/demon or -adjacent entities linked to the Forbidden Ones, some combination thereof, etc.