#qamekmaster

[the-northern-continent]

This is probably relatable to no one, but one of my absolute favorite things to do in Dragon Age games is to kick the 2nd playthrough up to Nightmare mode… but instead of playing the combat as intended, I do the doofiest, most cheesed-up nonsense to powerlevel my way past problems.

In Inquisition I would drop into stealth and then run around the Hissing Wastes reading the most xp-rich journals known to man. In Veilguard I just defeated the qamekmaster at around level 8. Well, “defeated” is a strong word, I stood on the tiny strip of balcony that counts as “in the combat area” without actually dropping into the room. Under my very heroic supervision, Lucanis and Harding handled the problem.

I got almost 2 full levels out of it. 😅

[rookamell]

Vague half-formed thought that Spite is sort of molded by Lucanis's inner rage/bloodlust and that's why the two of them don't really disagree while fighting/Spite doesn't try and take over during combat because he doesn't have to, really

[zaahvi]

some more interesting stuff that stood out to me from the IGN video!

(previous post)

this set of dialogue options makes me think "spite" is the demon that is possessing lucanis! that's definitely not one we've seen before yet!

this looks like a red lyrium ogre, but it's also possible it could be a qunari based on the qamekmaster we see later and the fact that this is in treviso (based on the surroundings and the crow's road rooftops location tag). i'm sticking to ogre though as it just looks more like one! it's interesting that it has a name though...

the qamekmaster in question ^^ qamek is a qunari poison used on mages. this qamekmaster must've been a qunari 👀 i talked about this more in detail here if anyone is interested.

sticking to treviso for a bit, these symbols - which i assume belong to the antaam? not even sure what they're supposed to be honestly. but the top really looks like ghil's head shape.

there's also one in the crows hideout here. maybe taken as a trophy? and hey that statue looks so cool??? i wonder who it is...

viagooooo!! and "the butcher" was mentioned before in the short story as we fly!

it seems that the antaam managed to invade so quickly because a traitor let them in 👀

beloveds mentioned <3

moving on from antiva, the way i audibly gasped when i saw this 😭 i've seen theories about it being the regret demon and i agree!! i think the boss itself is a revenant (as mentioned in the video), which are corpses possessed by demons - in this case the regret demon probably, but who was the corpse?

at a different point in the video you can see this, it looks like a tear in the veil like in the prologue but red? and it looks like there's tentacles on the other side

this statue in the hossberg wetlands is elven, and judging by the map marker i'm guessing it's either a fast travel point or party select point. it's blurry so hard to make out, but the crown looks like it could either be mythal's or the "nib" evanuris head shape (which i think is dirthamen). also is that a hand in the top left wtf

had to include this because 💀💀 lmao yikes

this line from harding was used in promo for her vows & vengeance episode last week!!

who or what is a rathera 👀

this seems like it could be a personal quest for neve!! or maybe a sidequest you can help her with

elgar'nan symbol above the bookshelf in the lighthouse library :) it's right in front of the elgarmythal mural in fact.

pics aren't very good, but you can see two more of what i assume are the "regrets" murals. the second one looks particularly interesting, though i can't make anything specific out

[kirkwallguy]

i think outside of cutscenes the game really does feel very da2-ish in a good way...i liked the qamekmaster sidequest

[thebookworm0001]

Spoilery things from today’s ign vid under the cut

BETRAYAL OF FELASSAN

SPITE

BLOODBOUND TO ELGAR’NAN

SOLAS TELLING YOU TO FIX THE MESS YOU MADE

HARDING BEING FUCKED UP FROM THAT BEGINNING CHOICE

OUTFITS ARE GORGEOUS

Sirin the twice-forged I am thinking ghil

As the gods’ champion passed freely, so will you - is this connected to that idea of an elf taking on the gods’ forms? did the gods have champions are we solas’?

Also the caretaker’s voice is cool as hell

Treviso is so fucking gorgeous

PET THE CATS AND DOGS

Was that a mabari???

Party banter pausinggggggggggg

Taash has a different hair color there what’s that about

VIAGO

damn combat looks cool

Present gods I’m afraiddddddddddsd

Elgar’nan being shitty directly tied to solas rebellion confirmedddddd

Oh my god we can play rock paper scissors with Manfred

MURAL MURAL MURAL MURAL MURAL WITH SOLAS MOHAWK HAIR ELGARNAN AND MHRHAL RISING TO BE GODS SOLAS YELLING AT THEM (WHY IS THIS A REGRET MY DARLING) also “WE” ARE NOT GODS ALSO ELGAR’NAN’S VOICE AND BROKEN EARTH WITH THOSE ORBY DEALIES TITIAN KILLING FOR ORBS

What the FUCK is the qamekmaster

[the-warmest-machine]

I AM DYING. Fighting for our lives against the Qamekmaster and when the HP is whittled to the faintest smidge, Rook is haggard and out of breath and Neve Gallus delivers the flattest most skeptical line.

Rook: I think we’ve just about got it!

Neve: Can you tell? Or are you guessing?

I just can’t.

[dreadfutures]

latest ign video discussion/speculation, spoilers.

the betrayal of felassan - revenant

the article text discusses a fight with a revenant - spirits of pride that inhabit suits of armor - and this armor looks an awful lot like the ones we've seen in the past - tho different shield and missing the skirt/spikes on the side of the helm. so probably a spirit embodying Solas's feelings about felassan - either about being betrayed or doing the betraying.

elgar'nan and mythal and solas mural

that there looks like the iconography we have always assumed meant "titan heart." There are three shown.

Their hands have the ripples of the Orb of Destruction

Mythal (familiar crown, huh!!!!) and her feather cape with shoulders that evoke Morrigan's new outfit.

Yeah yeah Solas with hair

IS KATE MULGREW BACK. She must be, considering how uncannily like her Claudia Black sounds - but in this scene in particular, IGN cut it to right after she MUST have spoken so we can't tell.

also.... does solas have a cuff on his left hand........

he and the elves with him do not (yet?) have vallaslin

other things:

the qamekmaster doesn't look blighted but instead mutated - so yeah like doom said, maybe ghil. But I'm inclined to also believe it's just plain alchemy gone wrong, the qunari fucking with stuff they shouldn't? or as a DAFF discord member pointed out, if ghilan'nain created the qunari, can she control the growth of their dragon aspects?

it looks like it's just overactive cancerous growth - the extra arms, the giant dragon horns, the dragon scales. maybe it plays into Taash's tale.

We see the names of Teia, Viago, and Irelin <3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3

PLEASE let Viago get really miffed when we talk to him about the king lmao

and.....

so. Lucanis is possessed by Spite. They may or may not be copacetic with one another.

[runningwolf62]

Hey did he say something about the Qamekmaster, the guy we're looking for, being locked up?

[perditus]

The Qamekmaster keep two-shotting me and I was getting mad but then I somehow triggered the fight without going down and Lucanis and Bell are doing it by themselves lol 😭

[sleepymarmot]

Okay so I did the first quest for the Crows, "A Slow Poison".

First of all, the quest fails to properly establish the stakes. 99% of the players don't know or don't remember wtf qamek is. It's the Qunari version of Tranquility/lobotomy, by the way. You wouldn't know that just from playing the quest, though. The only things my party said were:

Like, the revelation that occupation force on Treviso can produce mind-killing poison should be huge. And it definitely raised the stakes for me. But it wouldn't for any normal player of the game. There's a huge difference between "chips at your mind" and "lobotomizes you".

And it's not like conveying the danger is very difficult: just show the actual result of that magical lobotomy on screen. Dragon Age II did it with Tranquility in Anders's recruitment quest. Tevinter Nights did it with qamek itself in the first short story, Three Trees to Midnight.

Instead, we get the Qamekmaster himself. And by "get" I mean snippets of vague dialogue. We don't actually don't get a good look at him because there's no intro cutscene, only a boss fight. I think the Qamekmaster is supposed to be a Qunari... and he's been transformed how exactly? Turned into an ogre with the blight? Or with qamek? Has qamek actually been derived from the blight the whole time? Or has this guy innovated by creating a version of qamek that has the blight mixed in? Is there some kind of huge lore revelation hidden here? This makes the stakes even less comprehensible. What are we dealing with here? Poison? Lobotomy poison? Blight-spreading poison?

And then after the boss fight we read this:

So, let's try to recap the antagonists of this quest:

the Butcher (heard in voiceover, not appearing in person)

the Qamekmaster (boss fight, voice lines, this journal page)

someone who has stole the qamek

the human who betrayed the city

?? a new qamekmaster ?? (probably hasn't been found yet, and the time this title was said it was referring to the guy we fought)

Governor Ivenci (shows up at the Crow base to be angry at them, which apparently makes him a bad guy)

So this is a conspiracy plot involving an unclear number of NPC most of whom we haven't met, built around a threat that is not properly conveyed to the player. And that's in addition to the game's general portrayal of the Antaam and the Crows as factions. Great writing, everybody.

[thessalian]

Jallira!Rook vs Antiva

The streets of Treviso

Jallira!Rook: ...meep?

Bellara: I know, right? Wow; what a place!

Teia: ...I take it you two have seldom seen cities.

Bellara: I spend most of my time roaming around ruins, you know, and Rook ... well...

Jallira!Rook: If a city this large ever required Grey Wardens to any degree, something has gone very, very wrong. So small towns at most. Perhaps we can ... see the city once we've hired this ... Demon of Vyrantium?

Teia: Yes. About that...

The Ossuary, some time later

Jallira!Rook: .........

Bellara: You're ... not meeping. How angry is not-meeping?

Jallira!Rook: I am currently caught between "This is fascinating and a great deal of what is keeping this place unflooded seems to be in your realm of interest", "They talk about slaves so casually, these Venatori, and I dislike it", and "They are implanting demons into people and I dislike it immensely". The Wardens have ... some interesting history with that kind of thing.

Bellara: But ... you deal with darkspawn.

Jallira!Rook: Yes, well, we also had an issue during the Inquisition's time where a Venatori blood mage started pouring metaphorical poison and literal blood magic into a Warden Commander's ear, which resulted in the blood sacrifice of all too many non-mage Wardens to supply mage Wardens with a demon army, all under the effective command of an ancient blighted magister who wanted to be a god.

Bellara: ...wut.

Jallira!Rook: It is an exceptionally long story but I read about most of it even before Varric provided me the details. Either way, it seems these Venatori's plans backfired because clearly something escaped its initial bonds and--

Bellara: ...why are there undead?!?

Jallira!Rook: With this many corpses about the place, and blood mages, and demons as well? The answer to that seems obvious.

Bellara: And there's Venatori. Great--

Lucanis: *makes quite the entrance*

Bellara: ...Okaaaaaay...

Jallira!Rook: ...I have so. Many. Questions. I believe I will begin with, "Are you Lucanis? As in, properly Lucanis? Specifically, which of you is the passenger here?"

Lucanis: You are taking this remarkably calmly.

Jallira!Rook: I have heard a variety of stories about possession, and not all of them ended in grief. I suppose it depends on whether spirit or demon is strongest in your passenger at the moment. Also, I am a Grey Warden and we generally see three stranger things than you before breakfast. In any case, I am currently in an underwater prison full of Venatori, undead, and demons, rescuing a mage-killer so that he can help us assassinate effective gods. There is, if you'll pardon me, not much stranger this can get.

Lucanis: ...Fair.

Awhile later, after some fairly horrible news and as a desire to sublimate grief through work

Lucanis: Rook, where are you going? The barracks is that way!

Bellara: Ooooh, I know that look. And that posture. She's got hunting-stance on. This means she senses blight.

Lucanis: Blight? In Treviso?!?

Jallira!Rook: If it's of any comfort to you, it is largely contained and is unlikely to get into the canal system if it's dealt with promptly-- And that is a very large pustule of blight with something living inside it.

Bellara: Aaaaaaand I don't think those Venatori guarding it are going to like you trying to pop that pustule, y'know...

Jallira!Rook: Well, that is just tough beans for the Venatori.

Stabnation: *ensues*

A little while later, back on track

Jallira!Rook: ...I know something about qamek. Referred to at least once as sar-quamek, according to Varric. As much hallucinogenic drug as direct poison, but--

Lucanis: If you need to study it so badly, we can get a sample, but perhaps after we have destroyed the majority of it.

Bellara: Iiiiiiiiii don't think that was her point, Lucanis...

Jallira!Rook: Thank you. As I was saying, but that does nothing to explain why I sense blight.

Qamekmaster: *is a mutated abomination* FIGHT ME!

Lucanis: ...wut.

Bellara: ...So ... sorry, but ... still thinking that Ghilan'nain's creativity is atrophied?

Jallira!Rook: Someone needs to remind that particular deity that bigger is not always better, bulk sacrifices speed, and that an excess of horns makes for significant issues with overbalancing. And the arms - what is her obsession with pointy bits?!?

Lucanis: ...We ... are going to kill it, yes? You're not going to study it or ... stuff and mount it or something?

Jallira!Rook: Excuse me? Former qamekmaster, ser?

Lucanis: ...What are you doing?!?

Qamekmaster: *snarl*

Jallira!Rook: When you meet your god, tell her to do better in a way that does not involve a three year old's first drawing of a ram with mange.

Lucanis: ...all right, that was a good one.

Stabnation: *ensues*

Quite some time later, after dealing with a badly mutated qamekmaster

Lucanis: I wanted to pick up some things before we meet with Illario.

Jallira!Rook: Likewise. The Lighthouse is a lovely place all told, but not particularly well-supplied. Given access to a kitchen, I would prefer actually be able to use it.

Lucanis: You cook?

Jallira!Rook: When given the opportunity. The cook at Weisshaupt is ... unimaginative at best, so he is generally diverted at least once a week and one of the rest of us makes dinner. I tend to specialise in fish and fowl. Once, Antoine shot a great many ducks and I roasted those stuffed with local herbs, wild onions, and mushrooms. The cook wanted me locked up for two or three days as a warning to others, and there was very nearly a mutiny. Now we don't even have to lock him in a closet anymore; kitchen duty for junior Wardens now includes one day a week of their own cooking as standard.

Lucanis: Well then, we should compare notes. ...What is this?

Jallira!Rook: I saw you looking at this earlier, and I reasoned that an Antivan Crow could use as many knives as possible, so I purchased it. I've used wyvern-tooth daggers before. It's a good blade.

Lucanis: ...............How are you on coffee?

Jallira!Rook: A decent pick-me-up, but I find it needs what some people consider excessive sweetening to drink in quantity.

Lucanis: Ah well; no one is perfect. But I do have a suggestion when we meet Illario.

Jallira!Rook: Would that suggestion involve keeping an eye on him because he is remarkably twitchy at the moment and clearly not quite thinking straight?

Lucanis: No! ...Well, yes, but also no. ...I don't think I understand. You deal primarily with darkspawn, and other Wardens. How are you this good about reading people?

Jallira!Rook: When you're looking at villagers for any signs that they might be starting to go ghoul, and the elder senior Wardens to determine if they're near their Calling, you learn to read people.

Lucanis: ...Huh.

[veilkeeper]

could you please share the skill tree for your staff mage?

eek, sorry! i completely thought i responded to this already. my staff mage playthrough is still incomplete, but i can totally show you what i have so far.

as you can see, i am just shy of my specialization (which for this character will be evoker), and i have not spent all my points because i am saving them to dump into my spec on my next level up.

i'm building as an ice mage controller. staff only sacrifices a lot of speed, so i highly recommend taking frost nova and fade reflex as soon as possible. this will let you freeze the area around you (great when you're being ganged up on) and give you a slight slow time effect when you perfect dodge (super handy in fights against bigger enemies like the qamekmaster). bolt volley, the trait (?) right before the evoker spec, is also a must-have for staff only builds as (when you get the timing right) it lets you fire off more bolts and increases your dps.

generally speaking, i was prioritizing anything that would enhance the frozen affliction or upgrade my control abilities.

obviously i have not gotten into the mid to late game, but playing on adventurer i was having no real problems with this build whatsoever. careful in the boss fights, and don't get greedy—you can't just button-mash until you win with this build.

[barbiederiva]

Still cannot believe that I get to work with THE Lucanis Dellamorte!

Definitely not fangirling At All!

Anyway, gotta go beat up a qamekmaster now. After all, what do we say here?

That’s right Veilguard: The Crows rule Antiva, and Treviso will be free!

[lynxxtiel]

Just casually using the Qamekmaster as Perfect Defense practice.

Gotta have a purpose to all these Underdog defeats, I guess.

[wyvernscales]

Rather than make a post for each of my DATV thoughts, I’ve just put them all here. Spoilers for all of act 1:

Not Varric fulfilling the Duncan role this game

Why only Elgar’nan and Ghilan’nain tho? Why aren’t they all out

Strife!!! He doesn’t like me :(

FREAK DARKSPAWN ARE BACK BAYBEEE

Would smash the nadas dirthalen

Well D’Meta’s crossing was gross.

Why is there a human mayor of a town in Arlathan and why does he care about Ghilannain?

A Morrigan intro that doesn’t have her saying “well, well”????????

VALTA!HARDING

Bbg I’m so confused by the crossroads I don’t like these mapsssss

TEIAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!

Faceless horde of identical qunari occupying a city? How original.

Caterina’s kind of a gilf ngl

Underwater level uwu

Spite’s kinda…

No! Another gilf down :(

oh? Is the oracle the same thing that valta heard???

Yeah, yeah, dangerous relics or whatever. I’ve got kitties to pet and pottery to eviscerate

LuCANIS! All this talk of coffee kisses in front of your cousin??

Why is the Butcher called the Butcher if he’s the leader of the Antaam?

Why would the qamekmaster call them human traitors if all non-qunari are bas?

You can’t seriously make me believe the Crows are a moral group fighting for justice

Governor Ivenci only referred to with gender neutral pronouns. Another nb win

And Why would the Venatori be knowingly working with elven gods??

MAEVARIS MAEVARIS MAEVARIS

I don’t care how long I have to go running around killing darkspawn to get the chest in the creepy blight tree, I’m GETTING the chest

Worth it.

Idk, I’ve always imagined the Anderfels as snowy not… cactusy

Antoine is perhaps the most French man to exist ever. Not even Orlesian, French.

Hold on, I’ve gotta explode this cactus with my body

Gloom Howler’s kinda hot

Jesus FUCK this blighted dragon

Noticing a suspicious lack of anyone responding to Varric’s existence….

MYRNAAAAAA

TAAAAASH

When Harding talks about the inquisition all I can think about is the inconsistencies? Like, why would she remember Cole if he left or remained a spirit?

EEMMRICHHHHHH

I’ve only known this wisp for one second and if anything bad happens to it I will kill everyone and then myself

Em has canon father energy

LEMME AT THESE fucking CHESTS IN THE NECROTORIUM

MANFREDDSD

Ykw. Vorgoth can get it too

BELOVED Taash feeds the birdies

Karash has non binary swag

Wait wait. If Taash’s mom left the Qun bc she didn’t want her child to be in the Antaam, which would make them functionally a man then why is she ok with Taash being a warrior anyway? Seems odd to do this kinda plot with a group we’ve already established transness with

You can’t seriously think I’m gonna save the capital of the slave empire.

Davrin is dadcore

FORMLESS ONE!!!!!!!!!!!

A BELOVED wisp has gifted me a SPOON!

Astrolabe Restored

Well. Goodnight shadow dragons I guess.

candle hops are such cuties

My inquisitior would not behave like this.

So Aveline’s the Viscount and she’s allied with Sebastian, a guy who tried to annex Kirkwall in my worldstate

I kinda wanna play “Inquisitor saves Southern Thedas 2 Electric Boogaloo” if I’m being honest

I already collected all the wolfs regrets before meeting Inky. So. Yeah. That was a lot.

SO FLEMETH IS DEAD FRFR?????

How come the other gods are crazy looking and Mythal is just a normal elf

Oh this echo in the well thing is gonna be cool

Truly don’t know how much of these blight sound effects I can take tbh

ARE WE GOIN TO KAL SHAROK BAYBEE???

The Kal-Sharok armor kinda reminds me of the Sha-Brytol

The Valdasine Thaig is the primeval Thaig in 2 btw

VALTAAAAA

Ugh. I’ve always hated the ‘the old gods are related to the evanuris’ thing (tho I guess it’s not a theory). But we all thought Elgar’nan was Dumat tho right?

And if you can kill the Gods with the lyrium dagger, why didn’t he just do that? Like, we’ve already established that killing them with the dagger just fragments them.

I get that the fate of weisshaupt and all the wardens is important or whatever, but I’ve got chests to open beybee

Yeah bc it’s super easy to just off an Archdemon. what do you mean davrin’s killing it….

Well now killing an archdemon while it’s all tied down’s a bit unfair

Oh.

God that archdemon fight sucked.

[girlbob-boypants]

I feel like the Evanuris attacking Treviso would've felt more logical to me if the Antaam weren't already aligned with them. The attacks on both cities are clearly a twofold thing. Lure out Rook for the dagger, and also handle two of the larger political cities in the north.

For Minrathos it makes sense, hand the city over to your minions so they can rule it for you and remove the powerful mages who might oppose. As well as preventing an army from rising.

But Treviso is occupied by a non allied Antaam leader. I know there *are* allied Antaam leaders, but as others have pointed out it really doesn't make sense why they'd join powerful blight mages even if they split. imo it would've made more sense if the attack on Treviso was done to prevent the Butcher from establishing as a threat to their crusade.

It would've made for an interesting difference instead of making them exact copies. Variety is, after all, the spice of life. Then the writers could've explored the idea of establishing an alliance with the Antaam. Perhaps even having it be motivated by the Evanuris dominating blighted qunari into powerful soldiers like the qamekmaster was.

And if you let Treviso fall, there's ways to explore that both ways. A false front of power from a weakened Antaam. An offer of temporary peace. Rook trying to convince the Crows an alliance/truce would be good because the Antaam can help deal with the blight.

Idk. Idle musings of something that will never happen because the game is already done and out lmfao