#i dont think there's a way they could have included the hof and had it be completely satisfying

[danielnelsen]

i understand why the HoF wasnt in dai (and i think that was the correct choice) but im calling complete bullshit on that first sentence, especially after awakening (which is acknowledged because they sign off as 'warden-commander') and an ENTIRE DECADE of training potential.

nowhere near as egregious as hawke's writing (again..it would have been much worse for the hof to make an appearance, especially considering im already picking apart the one small letter they send), but it's a shame.

[crows-of-buckets]

Minor dav gripe but like

I really do wish there were a handful more things added in the worldstate menu. As of right now the two things I personally would add would be "does the hof live" and "did the Inquisitor drink from the well of sorrows"

The first one is so odd bc like. Davrin talks about being willing to die to the arch demon and how it's his duty and is inevitable and it felt. Very odd. That I couldn't say "but what about the hero of fereldan?" Like the dialogue could have even taken the same route as the regular conversation with davrin going "yeah but the hof isnt here and no one else knows how they did it". It feels. Odd. Because it is definitely something well known, even outside fereldan. Even more so if your rook is also a warden. Idk that really bugged me

The second one is literally just a minor minor annoyance but Emmrich has a dialogue about morrigan "possibly having turned into a dragon" and like. Again. It's a minor dialogue but if you're not gonna include the option for the well of sorrows why include the dialogue at all.

The lack of world state choices isn't really noticable in a lot of things, but I do feel it's stood out most with the wardens because of how influential the hero of fereldan is. Like c'mon there was a blight only 20 years ago and the guy who stopped it could possibly still be alive, why didn't they even cross our minds to look for? Also that guy stopped a blight in a YEAR with like six people why wouldn't we go talk to them?? Like yeah the south has got its own thing going on but cmon Morrigan definitely knows where they are

I have another thing (unrelated to worldstate choices) that I want to complain about, but its much more spoilery than above so its going under a cut

Spoilers for the end of the solas memory quest that I can't remember the name of (the one where you collect the wolf statues and experience solas's past)

Honestly, I liked most of the quest. The memories themselves were interesting and I do like the setup of how they played out. The fights were (mostly) fun (I did the level 25 one under leveled and had to restart like four times but it's fine I'm just a stubborn ass)

What I do NOT like is Flemeth's abuse being written down. This is another place where the lack of choice felt odd bc whether or not Morrigan has Kieran would change a lot I think. Bc Morrigan flat out says that she would never treat her child the way she was treated. And idk it felt like Flemeth got a "get out of abuser jail free" card bc she's mythal.

I dont even mind Morrigan taking in Mythal's memories tbh. It's a very in character thing for her to do.

Idk like. On one hand yeah Morrigan would probably have mixed feelings about her mother dying even if she was her abuser it just. Didn't feel like those emotions were mixed. Idk it just kinda annoyed me. I had a feeling Flemeth wasnt going to be portrayed as harshly and I hate to be right sigh

Other than that I did like this quest. I enjoyed talking to a different side of mythal and gaining her favor lmao. If I had a nickel for every dragon age protagonist that had an odd connection to mythal...

The flashbacks made me much more interested in the Titans, and I'm excited to see where Hardings story goes.

Ultimately, so far nothing that annoys me is anything that will make me hate the game. I have things I dislike about every dragon age game, its just a thing that happens lmao.

[breadedsinner]

i do believe og da2 writers could have made something cool with envy demon and sebastian and the whole thing about not possessing but replacing the victim. but Everything Is About Demons is certainly getting old you are right and fandom reaction just never disappoints lol. Lol. lmao. sooo sorry yall dont have taste

gonna start saying that the exalted march version of anders returning to wardens is the only way to make him interesting just to feel something

Well said. Again, I don't think the concept is wholly unsalvageable, and it was just a tweet, but it could be read at face value like the character--a playable character and a love interest--might have just been done away with. She didn't expand on it and it didn't come to pass anyway, I would HOPE there would have been an alternate scenario where we free him from Envy.

Still a little perplexed by Envy. It makes SOME sense but if you told one "one of the new demons was originally created with Sebastian in mind" I think I would have sooner guessed the Sorrow Demon.

And I don't agree that it's "poetic", I suppose there's some tragedy in that all this grief and trauma simply begets more and becomes a cycle... but she didn't really word it that way. It was hard not to read it as a punishment. Obviously I am biased, but I previously covered all the ways Sebastian expressed his concerns before the Chantry Boom, so for him to constantly be put in the wringer this way is unsatisfying. There's no catharsis, no release, it's just constant misery.

And then yknow... Fenris gets to escape that cycle. Cullen does, Blackwall does, Leliana does... I don't like the idea that Sebastian doesn't because he cared about someone and didn't handle the loss well.. When people talk about how he SHOULD have acted, it always sounds like someone who has never experienced loss, quite frankly.

That said, there are a LOT of companions, including those listed above, who can befall a terrible fate. We've even seen early concept Inquisition art of what shows a ragged Anders in a cave. And I believe there was talk of Varric dying in the Exalted March DLC. It's very possible this DLC could have included some brutal paths for all the companions, who knows.

I guess I just wish it had been made clear that Sebastian could also escape this future as well. Him being unpopular doesn't mean he doesn't deserve closure.

Pfft I have no feelings about Anders going back... it'd be funny if the HoF was just like "I don't want him anymore" or "Welcome Home Cheater".

[battlestar-royco]

Imagine if Sorscha lived? I'm rereading HoF(because I hate myself) and I'm seeing so much potential in her character. Sjm mentioned that healers had the most powerful magic once and in the next scene introduces Sorscha a healer. Then she's talking about refugees and spies in Eyllwe and it turns out Sorscha was one of them. And the worst part is she told us a few lines before she dies. Sjm is a tell not show author and it shows. You know how interesting it would've been in Sorscha's POV to see

(Part 2 of Sorscha ask) Her conversing with Ren and deakin out of the castle secret passageways that Ren talked about. And seeing her try to warn Ren (the man that asked her to spy) abo ute plans the king were contriving. And not only that everything she's ever loved burned in front of her and parents killed in Ardalans immigrant purge?? SHE HAD TO SEE THAT AS A CHILD? And you're telling me she was boring or WEAK as Dorian said(not my Dorian) Why have so much potential for a character

Part 3 of Sorscha And she was from Eyllwe. I hate that strength to SJM is killing, bloodied shit. That doesn't make you strong. That doesn't make a strong person nor character. A strong character is complex, like a good person who in despite everything has happened having no obligation to do the right thing who is shy and thinks less of herself still decides to spy and risk her life for people that dont care for her. Not only that imagine a healer as a queen Sorscha deserved better.

I knooooow, Sorscha was the ultimate side character bamf and she deserved so much more than the part she was forced to play in the T0G series. I’m so sick of black girls being used as B plots or one-offs to further the main story. I’ve said time and again that I really like how SJ/M sets up characters, but the longer we spend time with them, the more they get ruined (or killed). Sorscha was so interesting to me--a refugee, a rebel, healer, someone who got the attention of the crown prince. The excuse that “she had to die” for the story to go on is just ridiculous. If E/lide can be a secret part human/part witch agent who befriends the most dangerous witch in the Witch Kingdom and transports one of three W/yrdkeys across the continent; if Lisandra can be a sex worker shapeshifter who looks out for young girls who grew up in the same terrible system she did; if Irene can be a healer who bartends her way through school and becomes mentor to all the other healers in the best healer school in the world; Sorscha and Nehemia could have lived on to become the most stellar and badass rebel spies/princesses/refugee advocates known to the T0G universe. I also hate how the fandom has so much fan art and meta for side characters who showed up in one book or have equal/lesser parts than Sorscha and Nehemia, but Sorscha and Nehemia are somehow the ones who always get whitewashed or ignored in fan art. I saw an artist say they wouldn’t draw Sorscha because she was a completely flat character who they couldn’t connect to--this after making portraits for almost all the T0G and AC0TAR characters, including people who showed up for one scene or in the last book. The way the books are written is so unfair and the violence/apathy is clearly targeted toward Sorscha and Nehemia in a racial way.

[bitchryver]

Headcanons on how the ToG series might have gone if Sam and Nehemia had stayed alive? I’ve been pondering on it myself, since I want to write a fanfic kinda involving how that dynamic would have played out with the story.

oooohhhh my gooooddd im so delighted you asked me that I have SO many thoughts!!! I’d love to read a fanfic like that bc im always……thinkin abt it

okay so in MY head it goes a lil somethin like this:

In terms of Sam, the plot of the final story in TaB goes ahead as it does in canon- Arobynn tells Celaena that Sam is dead, BUT this time he tells her one of his spies reported they saw sams body in Rourke Farrans house.

So good ol celaena, like the big dumb chaotic aries moon she is and forever will be, goes to farrans house for revenge.

Except- its a trap to catch her, like it is in canon, and she ends up in endovier.

But this time, instead of grieving for sam and dealing with the fact that arobynn might have betrayed her, she believes both arobynn AND sam have betrayed her

Maybe because she doesn’t see sam in farrans so she thinks its a trap, or maybe arobynns plan to seperate the two is to manipulate the two apart by sowing that seed of doubt in celaena, knowing that she will return to only trusting him, so he plans to have celaena think sam is in on it 

Now when Sam hears celaena’s gone to endovier? loses it. He’s totally suspicious of Arobynn and enlists the help of lys & Wesley to get revenge/ and or get her out. 

I don’t know whether he would stay with arobynn- part of me imagines celaena being gone means he’d have to pay off his debts again or something, maybe he wants to hang around arobynn to gather more information about why he set celaena up

i don’t really think he could bear to live in celaenas apartment, because i think he’d feel REALLY guilty and angry.

so sam doesn’t succeed in breaking celaena out before dorian gets to her, and i think he as a character would grow a bit tougher and a bit meaner. maybe throw himself into the pit fighting a bit more.

so dorian comes to exploit  i mean free celaena, and then i think the plot progress as normal- in terms of how nehemia is introduced, and how their relationship develops.

[quick side note-i think celaena, still reeling from what she thinks is a betrayal, and then a terrible year, maybe does go through with the dorian half-romance b plot in the first book, and then can’t go through with it in the end. I don’t think she would go for chaol at all, because part of the reason she’s drawn to him is the sense of stability he provides, and because its a chance for the life she wanted with sam-  stability and sam-like traits work against her in this timeline; why would she be so taken when chaol says he’d leave adarlan with her? Sam promised to do the same and he betrayed her.]

Now in terms of Nehemia- like i said, the plot progresses as normal in terms of their relationship and interactions, and nehemias desire to force celaena to become the person she needs her to be- this time, NOT because she think aelin/celaena is the only one who can save her people or her country or whatever, but because her firepower and her country are valuable assests to the strategy nehemia wants to plan for her country/

and nehemia is working on dorian AND aelin at the same time, but she feels way less bad for dorian. She’s determined that this is what needs to be done, that it HAS to be done that way, but she’s really struggling with the guilt of watching celaena clearly struggle a year out of endovier.

I think she’d also be slightly, secretly angry at celaena/aelin- like she COULDN’T understand why and how aelin would want to shirk her role as a queen. And I can see that tension being there for a while as a response to nehemias guilt, maybe to mask it, because she genuinely has come to love celaena.

So I think it goes one of two ways- Nehemia fakes her death as a way of escaping the castle and the dodgy rebels to get back to Ellywe with the information she’s learned, making an educated guess that doing so will tip the emotional tether in celaena to force her to become aelin. aelin = firepower = fighting skills = terrasen army. jackpot.

OR celaena eventually confies in Nehemia, instead of chaol that she’s the Queen, and then its Nehemia who convinces the King to send her to Wendlyn.

And that creates a massive tension because celaena is like WHAT i JUST told you these people are literally related to me 

And she’s angrier than she’s ever been because this, to her, is betrayal no. 2

Maybe its that anger, instead of grief that fuels her revival as aelin. 

So then back to Sam- I don’t know exactly  if he’d be part of the Terrasen resistance, but I think maybe celaena being taken to endovier, run by adarlan tips him into Fuck Those Guys territory.

Either way, when celaena runs into Archer in book 2, archer goes back to sam to say GUESS WHAT

celaena is not only alive, but working for the king! she’s the kings champion!

Sam either takes this well: I cant believe they would make her work for them how terrible are they lets keep resisiting them 

Or he takes it badly i.e “You mean to tell me I’ve been working against adarlan FOR her this entire time and she’s been working for them happy as a clam? she just SIGNED over her life to the guy?? Fuck her”

Because here’s the thing- I don’t see a role for a chaol in a world where sam is still alive, because I think sam would fill the role chaol occupies in com/hof/qos/tod/- the bitter, jilted lover who felt like they gave up SO much for her and look what she’s gone and done that stupid bitch

Im saying this based on how sam confesses to celaena in TaB- he knows they are BOTH being abused by arobynn, he knows he’s the only one of the two that recognises it as abuse, and he still says to her that he can’t be around her if she “chose” arobynn over him. He doesn’t really….want to share.

OR option 3: In the timeline where Nehemia sends Celaena to Wendlyn, Nehemia herself stays in Adarlan and continues working with the rebels, one of whom is Sam. From Sam she learns more about celaenas back story and begins to feel a bit more understanding of her, and begins to queitly pray that she’s done the right thing, that celaena will understand why it had to be done. I don’t think she would make apologies for it, but she would be genuinely concerned about how she’s doing over there, unlike every other character in hof.

But Sam learns from Nehemia about Celaenas brief dalliance with Dorian, or learns from Aedion about who she actually is. I don’t think it would be the knowledge of who she is that bothers him, like it did chaol, but instead the idea, warped by the bitterness of her and dorian, that she had all this power all this time and ran away from it. I see that being that kicker in the confrontation, and I see Aelin having to have the conversation on the balcony with him instead of chaol.

Ok so second side note, and i havent finished koa so i dont know if we meet the royal family in Ellywe or if we learn whether or not they knew about her plans but in the timeline where Nehemia returns to Ellwye, the court and her family are FURIOUS with her, 1. because she’s the heir to the throne in an increasingly dangerous environment what do you mean you faked your death  to escape the country are you fucking serious??? WHY??? and maybe these grown men in her court don’t take her seriously because thats a big theme.and then 2. because her court are annoyed she took the iniative to do something so they keep chipping away at her- where is your firebringer- oh she’s not here? and we don’t have a guaranteed alliance? and you’re not in contact with the rebels because 1. they think youre dead and 2. one of their leaders was murdered by your friend to avenge you? Hows that gonna help. So she has to fight for their approval the same way aelin later fights darrow. what a beautiful parallel that would be.

Like imagine the JOY and relief and FEAR nehemia would feel upon hearing about aelin setting maeves people on fire- she begins to wonder for the first time,,, who is it she’s actually unleashed…. and will she want to help her?

Sorry I know thats SO long and rambly and kind of aelin centric i literally dont know how to write ANYTHING without including ms [g]a[y]shryver in it. also i cannot,,,,,, spell,,,, but THANK YOU for this ask i hope your fanfic goes well!!!!!