#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. 😅

[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

[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.

[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.

[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

[vigilskept]

48. Does Rook have any unfinished personal business that needs to be resolved? (What’s their loyalty quest?)

oh this is such a fun question!! her loyalty quest would hinge on the question of whether she can see a future with the crows (with a secret bonus option)

putting it all under the cut bc i had to scroll past this post once and i’m not doing it again 💀

you have to start by building back her confidence in her capacity to do the job, so she's the one who gets the assignment from viago for to find dareth. she'll then finish his contract on the qamekmaster, which goes a long way toward feeling that she's earning her place back.

the first branch happens after you report back to viago. you'll get a cutscene back at the lighthouse where dinara shares that she feels responsible for the crackdown on the crows after she freed the antaam's captives.

you can express that you think taking initiative was the right thing to do, or that she's learned from her mistake. these will impact her trajectory within the crows, but both are viable choices if she stays. if you want the secret ending, pick the first option here.

the loyalty checkpoint is early. you have to try to get her and viago to actually... communicate. godspeed and good luck. if you stop pursuing her quest before you pass this point, she will get herself killed from lack of foresight/trying to make up for her mistake depending on what you chose in the first branch.

if you do pass the checkpoint you've already gotten her hero of the veilguard status, and will get some nice looking crow mage armour either way!

the second branch depends on what choices you made prior up to that point, so you don't get much input. it comes up when she discovers that her family has been in rivain this whole time. it's a pretty tense reunion as they're unhappy she's become a crow (while she only became one bc she had no family left in antiva!).

if you said she's learned from her mistakes, she won't express any interest in reconnecting with her family. she will stay a crow no matter what, though you can encourage her to stay in touch with them.

if you supported her taking initiative, she will start making inroads with her family herself! they do not patch things up overnight, but they're all making the effort. this path opens the door to the secret ending where she stays with them.

throughout the game she will have expressed increasing interest in learning about spirits and the fade. it won't be to you directly, aside from her asking you about your experience when you talk about experiencing memories of fen'harel's rebellion. mostly, you'll see her hanging out in emmrich's room to ask him questions, or chatting with mourn watch or rivaini seer npcs throughout the game.

the final branch is where the inevitable andrastian terror sets in.

you'll have the option to say that you think it's too dangerous to keep learning about it. in this case, she will stay with the crows and will stop talking about it with any npcs. she will also keep her distance from spite and manfred.

if you encourage her to stay open minded about it instead she will leave the crows! she'll work out an arrangement with viago to run a safehouse in rivain for house de riva, but she will not take out any contracts of her own after finishing this one from varric.

fifty (more) questions for rook

[abyssal-ilk]

so let me get this straight. we are given three named antaam members (the butcher, dragon king, and qamekmaster) and despite how much the dragon king and butcher are hyped up, they're all killed just minutes after they are introduced. we get nothing about any of their men, we barely get any information about any of their motivations, conflicts, ect, and... that's it. this is both embarrassing and disappointing. jfc.

oh hiii butcher. so nice to finally meet you. sweating just a little bit

[zaahvi]

this is what i found most interesting too! based on the line "Poison? No, you face the gift of the gods!" i don't think the qamek is connected, and the gift in question is... well, take a look at what the qamekmaster looks like:

like, what in the ghilan'nain is that? the hands.... and i can't even tell if those are horns or tentacles

i have an idea - includes spoilers from the mage gameplay last week so i'll put it under a cut:

i think the antaam could be working with the evanuris, somehow. OR alternatively, the evanuris took control of them. somehow. based on the fact that we see blight in treviso in the release date trailer, and on this said during the mage gameplay:

"The darkspawn aren't just coming out of nowhere, the blight is spawning them; again, part of Ghilan'nain's attempt to turn this into an army for the gods... ... whereas you have the Venatori and the Antaam, in one case representing magical power and in the other case representing physical strength, the darkspawn are representing overwhelming force." [source with timestamp]

when i first heard that i figured that they were referring to the other threats you may face in the game and not necessarily connected to the evanuris (especially considering venatori following elven gods is... a strange thought lol) but now... maybe they are all working together after all? 👀

a compilation of everything evanuris related from the new IGN video!

and bonus commentary from the video/article:

"Another clear reaction to criticisms of Inquisition are our villains in The Veilguard, Elgar'nan and Ghilan'nain. The two elven gods feel much more present throughout the events of the early game than Corypheus, the frankly lackluster baddie of Inquisition. ... ... [Solas'] history, along with the history of the Evanuris, are baked into The Lighthouse, and you learn more and more about the threat you face as you unlock Solas’ murals with various wolf statues. You even get to see some of his memories firsthand."

[transmasc-tabris]

Okay continuing. Trying to update this post every time I play for more than like 30 minutes so I can remember my first impressions.

First off Teia is so pretty I could die and I'm glad I finally read eight little talons a few days ago.

Got Bellara's outing and I'm gonna eat the walls. Ahhhhhh fuck she's so *incoherent sound* Like really besides that the score in all her scenes feels like a corny movie I'm having a good time with her.

Speaking of score so much of that has mass effect vibes too. The underwater prison especially.

Neves outing too it was so nice. So far I'm not one hundred percent sure on my opinion of her. I'm starting to think she'll turn out to be a rather simple type of character but in a way that I'll definitely enjoy. She seems... reserved, but not quite like she's keeping people away, more like she doesn't think they'll ever want to get close.

Lucanis - got coffee with him and I like him well enough. He is definitely not hitting as hard as the last crow we got but he's alright.

Got Davrin for five minutes and I already like him very much. Too bad the second I finished recruiting him The Choice showed up and I had only been to Treviso once. Sooo gonna have to do that again. Quite intrigued by whatever the hell is going on with the gloom howler.

The way Neve calls bellara Bell and how they read serials together and Bellara is her number one fan girl? Nevellara real? Neve/Rook/Bellara the throuple ever? Please?? If bioware won't do it then I will I have ao3 and some free time. (Sorry, I've been afflicted with the Brain Rot again)

Got to see Dorian and that was nice.

And wait Mae was one of the SD founders did I hear that right?

Lorelei I'd die for you.

So there's at least some darkness to the crows (Jacobus? Why are you like thirteen just kidding I know exactly why but *screech*) and I'm holding back on a full opinion on them in this game until later but it is weird that I'm expected to at least kind of disagree with the person saying 'hey maybe the guild of assassins bought off the streets as children or bred for this life since birth shouldn't run a country and shouldn't be the closest it has to an army'. Like nah they've got a point. A country can only get away with not having an army as long as there's no reason to have one.

But anyway it does feel like darker stuff is there but definitely much more apparent to people who've played every other game and at least read some of the outside stuff.

Game I don't want to save Caterina (but I don't know if a new player would have any strong feelings about her). I can see how it's the practical thing to do but ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

Oh, zip lining is weird but kinda fun.

So are the Antaam basically ogres because Blight Gods or what? That's gotta be it since there's ordinary qunari citizens who seem, well, ordinary. Not to mention the qamekmaster and all that.

Oh, uh. Neve 'you should have said no the job'? Ma'am what do you mean? I'm scared.

Harding it was kinda rude of you to waltz up to varrics room and only talk to rook but you're pretty and under much stress so it's whatever.

(probably not romancing her this go but got a flirt line with her that was so cute I made a stupid noise)

Speaking of dialogue it hasn't been that bad. Not great but hardly horrible, though there have been some moments that feel very 'we don't trust you to have actually read the note you just picked up so we're gonna just say it'

Oh and Solas treating those spirits as expendable. Knowing he's just destroying them? Well. Well then I'll.

So just collecting my thoughts on DAV so far. Literally only a couple hours in at this point since life will not just Stop for a second.

Okay first off. Character Creator? Chef's kiss. God damn. Took me forever but I enjoyed it. Also haven't made a qunari character yet but I did take a look at some of the options and neither hair nor horns were as bad as I'd feared. There are options that aren't trash.

Glad I could give my first Inquisitor the glorious braid, broad shoulders and generally haunted look he deserves.

But also? What does -18% mean for height???? I don't know. I managed to make my Rook a little shorter than Neve after a few tries so it's all good.

Moving the camera with the mouse is still something I'm getting used to, but considering all the times I fucked up in DAI and ended up running around looking at the top of my character's head, I'm fine with this new way of doing things.

The new darkspawn design? Not as bad I thought it would be. Same with the new demon design.

Combat - Well they said it was going to feel like mass effect and it mostly does. Obviously like if you took out the guns but you know what I mean. I keep expecting that one death theme to play when my Rook goes down. Like with every bioware game I've played (besides DAI, actually) it's either a breeze or a death fest with little in between. That could be a skill issue on my part though. I do like the actiony feel and the way it seems to be leaning into the absurd athleticism for rogues.

Do wish I could turn off or tone down companion dialogue in combat though. Tone down most likely. I don't hate it (how could I hate supportive Harding??) it just happens too frequently in my opinion.

Love that running around and looting instead of fighting is now canonically on brand for my Rook. True lord of fortune moment. Speaking of - LoF casual outfit is growing on me.

Irelin is so pretty I could cry. So are a lot of others but she wowed me.

This could easily have to do with the fact that I'm playing it on nvidia geforce now but it does seem like the voices are a little bit... off from the characters? Like ahead of or behind their mouths moving our sounds like it's coming from a different place altogether. I dunno there's just something a little weird about the voices in general but that's a massive nitpick and not a huge deal.

Solas hates blood magic now? Wasn't he pretty neutral on it before? Then again, I'd lie in those circumstances too.

Still wish we'd had more than three world choices to choose from especially if characters from previous games are coming back, but at the very least they are making it easy for a new player or someone who hasn't played a da game since dai came out to just jump in.

Fuck the lighthouse is beautiful.

Pretty much all technical at this point since I've literally just met Bellara at this point. Oh Merrill you would have loved her.

[bigbadlesbiab]

OK but what's the deal with the "Qamekmaster?" Because qamek is the poison the Qunari use to break people's will to resist the Qun. Is it connected to the Evanuris? Does that mean the Qunari got it from them? If so, how? Could this mean the Qunari are connected to ancient Elvhenan somehow after all?

a compilation of everything evanuris related from the new IGN video!

and bonus commentary from the video/article:

"Another clear reaction to criticisms of Inquisition are our villains in The Veilguard, Elgar'nan and Ghilan'nain. The two elven gods feel much more present throughout the events of the early game than Corypheus, the frankly lackluster baddie of Inquisition. ... ... [Solas'] history, along with the history of the Evanuris, are baked into The Lighthouse, and you learn more and more about the threat you face as you unlock Solas’ murals with various wolf statues. You even get to see some of his memories firsthand."