#wtf blackwall

[grapecaseschoices]

well I HAVE wondered how he alwys seemed to be at her height when they up in each other's faces

[ramenrutherford]

I love how everyone is equally hyped and dreading Dragon Age: Veilguard. We'll buy it, we'll play it, but we are sure we won't be happy with it.

[wolfsong-the-bloody-beast]

They believe you’re the Herald because they need to. Without that hope, all that’s left is despair. We’re both bound by duty. Our lives aren’t ours to live. Don’t make this harder than it has to be.

[andrewknightley]

in the fade with 5 warriors and 1 rogue no mages i think we will do just fine. no one knows shit.

[musicfeedsmysoul12]

Brutal Honesty Time: Dragon Age Companions Edition

Origins

I never really LIKED Alistair. No hate to those who do but I never vibed with him. He looked like my brother at the time I was playing so romance was OFF the table, but later when my brother grew his hair out ala Thor, I did romance him and while it’s cute I’m still: eh. I do think he’s best friends with some of my Wardens and do headcanon his relationship with Thea Surana is adorable (Muirin is not a good partner though.) but I just… meh.

Also, I cannot see this man as anything but straight and it’s just… I can’t. To me he’s the himbo lovable guy but he’s just not into dudes.

Wynne also never appealed to me in the sense that I felt she was preachy as fuck. She was to much a ‘older wiser mentor’ for the players and yet I felt that she was also the granny who was without a doubt to set in her ways. I have a headcanon that the Spirit of Faith that possessed her actually bound her to rigid rules. As such she cannot change really.

Dragon Age 2

Anders is to me right in his goals but I think killing him is still a reasonable reaction. I it really depends on who you play as but I’ve always felt that while I would be personally horrified the fact the Chantry did NOTHING to help the people they claim to watch over and the hell the Circles became are on their shoulders. Anders was RIGHT. But a Hawke killing him doesn’t make them wrong. Also he’s like my fifth fav romance in DA2. Yes I mean I like Sebastian’s over his. I just never clicked with Anders despite some epic lines.

Aveline as well I never… liked? To the extent others do I mean. She’s interesting but I was always wtf about her comments. She feels like a character they were forced to sort of shuffle into the story without finishing. Her entire Act 2 quest is atrocious (oh you must help her with a man really?) and I would love to explore her slowly coming to the realization that she was wrong in her actions/the system itself is broken. I think there’s a fantastic post going around to break this down firmly but I can’t really remember who made it. She’s a character I have to aggressively headcanon like Cullen to put up with.

Varric comes up to and for me… he is fun. He’s a fav for me. But I’m also sick of this guy. Most of my Hawkes are his friend because I love the ‘storyteller is the lovable rouge’ trope but like I have a few Hawkes he did not like. Yet here we are with him being besties. I really wish if we needed a continuing companion it was Dorian who has REASON to be in Tevinter. Varric can at in Kirkwall.

Inquisition

Actually a brutal honesty moment is me going: this game is rank 3 for me out of the three so far. I don’t HATE it. It’s a fun game. But god the entire open world they tried SUCKED. It’s so tedious I get bored after Haven is destroyed.

Blackwell has the better romance compared to Cullen and no you can’t tell me otherwise. It’s much more dramatic and impactful and I love him. Also people saying he killed kids ignore how the Templars murder children and how Cullen 100% was an accessory to it even if he didn’t do it himself. Also I always find it funny there’s uproar over Blackwall doing this when there is a graduation system where they MURDER INNOCENT PEOPLE but oh no that’s never discussed. Plus with how much other shit goes down- yeah Blackwall is irredeemable totally when it’s HUMAN NOBLE children who die.

I’ve said my piece about Cullen being a disappointment of a character.

I never actually liked Cassandra and even after romancing her she’s still bottom of them in my list. I’m just not able to make anyone hate me.

[valiant-if]

So listen.

I've been replaying Dragon Age: Inquisition, which I actually started doing before Veilguard's release date was announced, so it's just convenient that I've been doing so, but I've put a total of somewhere over 2000 hours into playing DAI since it came out in 2014, so I haven't been in any rush to get through it.

I'm petsitting this weekend, and I decided that I might want to play it, so I copied over my mods and the ReShade I was using onto a drive so that I could play the game on my laptop with the same mods and settings.

And I went to do Dorian's personal quest last night, and Halward Pavus walked down the fucking stairs, and I was like, "Who the HELL is THAT?" Because his face was totally different. Like, completely, staggeringly different. And I thought I had noticed that Loghain looked weird too, but I was like, eh, maybe I just imagined it. But then Halward Pavus absolutely threw me, I was like, no there's gotta be something wrong with my mods.

So I went hunting, right? Cuz I don't have any mods that alter the appearance of NPCS outside of one that changes Blackwall's hair, so I was like, wtf is changing these faces? I removed all my mods and still had the issues, so I was like, oh my god, is the copy of the DAI Mod Manager that I'm using laced with some mods without telling me? Did the official patch from the mod manager fuck up my game?

So I did a clean install of the game, and his face was still fucking weird. So I figured, oh well, it's not like it matters that much to me, it's just fucking strange, like, he looks like he's young enough to be Dorian's brother.

So I continued playing for a few hours, and then it occurred to me... I have never played DAI on this laptop before, so who knows what the graphics settings were set to? Sure enough, they were defaulted at medium even though this laptop is capable of ultra, so I changed the settings and went back to an autosave of the scene, and sure enough it was just the graphics settings causing the problem.

Which is still absolutely fucking wild, because lowering the graphics didn't just smooth some of the textures and use a lower poly count, it turned Halward Pavus into a completely different person. I have never seen graphics settings change how a character looks so drastically before. I'm still absolutely thrown by how fucking weird he looked.

If you have only ever played Inquisition on medium settings or lower, I beg of you to look at his screenshot on the wiki or something, he literally looks nothing like his lower-graphics self.

So anyway, I wasted 45 minutes trying to fix a mod issue that never existed. The end.

[clairedelune-13]

Biggest sins amongst the DA community are hair mods for Solas and the ones that remove Blackwall’s beard.

Wtf is this? WHO ARE THESE MEN?!?!

[little-elf-wanders]

I think because we get to choose what our Inquisitors did instead of importing the world states, I'll make my Inky Solas's ex. Because although I like Iron Bull, I'll be honest... none of the romance in Inquisition actually captured me like Origins or Da2 did. (Which isn't bad, not every game will hit the mark for everyone) Don't get me wrong, I'm fond of the group in Inquisition but I'm not attached enough to care about who shows up in da4. I was much more platonically attached to that group. Like with Varric and Cole and Viv.

I'd gotten wrapped up in "FIRST QUNARI ROMANCE!" when Iron Bull was introduced and I did have fun but... as an asexual with a low libido I suppose the BDSM link to him and ass slaps weren't really things that did much for me for the long haul, which is ironic since my origins obsession was Zevran, but he had bigger depth to him than just... 'haha horny'. Cheeky and fun, yes. But not something I'll be eager to latch onto. Cullen was alright but... meh. Nostalgia really led that one in the beginning but... The most excited I got in Trespasser was seeing the Mabari, and you can't marry a guy for his dog. Josie was cute but was more for my Trevelyan. I didn't romance Sera or Cass. Or Dorian. Blackwall was reserved for my dwarf playthrough but by then I lost access to the game and the dlc due to irl circumstance and it was forgotten about. And then, of course, I got older. I'm in my 30's now, so I value different things. Yet weirdly, my love for Zevran and Fenris is absolutely cemented. (Would I have romanced Sten? Yes. Isabela is a close second. But Zev and Fenris just remain in my affections like Garrus does.)

Largely, the Inky I got attached to was Lavellan - a specific Lavellan - and two of those romances just wouldn't happen due to sexualities, plus... Sera's like a kid sister in maturity levels. So once my initial hype around it all calmed down, I noticed I was ironically writing fanfic and interactions between my two oc's more. Trevelyan and Lavellan. And also another oc with a friends oc. It wasn't companion centred at all and I was more just enamoured with the setting. The world. There's a scarce few probably around with Cullen and Bull but I felt much more committed to the oc's relationship than theirs.

SO, I think for da4, I might just go the drama route of a strained ex situation with Solas. If only for Rook to sip coffee and gossip about 'wtf happened there.' Because I did try to give the Solas romance a shot, and in some areas I see why the Solavellan girlies go nuts but - he still didn't change my mind on him. BUT I'm down for storybeats and narrative drama soooooo.

[grapecaseschoices]

i know people dont like playing warrior in da. but grappling hook has to be one of the sexiest and coolest moves ever on a per-specialization ability tree.

[redlyriumidol]

currently writing a very self-indulgent scene where Hawke interacts with some of the dai companions at skyhold, so here's my thoughts on how she'd get along with all of them: (very purple hawke, to the point of extreme insensitivity at times, kind of selfish. she's not the nicest. I love slightly amoral protagonists okay)

Blackwall: Blackwall wouldn't like her. He'd think she was extremely stuck-up. (and she is). Hawke, for her part, would find him dull and beneath her concern. Manly beardy man. Who cares.

Cassandra: Cassandra obv has a bad case of hero-worship when it comes to Hawke, but I think the reality of her would be somewhat of a rude awakening- only somewhat, though, because Hawke would actually kind of like Cassandra. That manifests as teasing but slightly more generous than it would be towards a man (like Blackwall)

Cole: Cole likes almost everyone and he'd see through her use of humour as a self-defence mechanism in an instant. He sees that deep down, she does care. This would make Hawke uncomfortable, and she would avoid him.

Cullen: LOL. Hawke would have a grand old time making fun of him, just like old times. But in a subtle way where Cullen would not understand he was being made fun of. Deep down, she's kind of pleased to see him though, and especially to see he's left the Templars.

Dorian: They'd get along decently, though Dorian might see her as unnecessarily mean at times. Still, he's good at taking that sort of thing in stride. Hawke would like him quite a bit.

Iron Bull: ooh they'd get along for sure. Hawke would be fascinated by this oddity among Qunari, Bull would have mad respect for her for defeating the Arishok. Any barb she could fire just bounces off him, which is something Hawke REALLY likes. Great fun.

Josephine: first of all Hawke would be attracted to her so she'd just be flirty. Josephine would be nonplussed but feel positively towards her.

Leliana: Hawke would not DARE make fun of Leliana. She would be uncharacteristically respectful. Leliana would be shrug emoji but civil.

Sera: major lesbian rivalry! But in a way they'd sort of get on. Hawke would find her hilarious but also kind of look down on her; Sera would find her hilarious but also kind of think she's stuck up. Which, again, she is.

Solas: Hawke would wtf and be like nope, not touching that one. Solas wouldn't like her, she's too disrespectful about... everything

Varric: obviously, Varric adores her and she adores Varric. They're best mates and Varric is totally blind to her flaws lol

Vivienne: god this would be a shitshow. Vivienne is predisposed to hate Hawke for her role in the mage uprising and her defence of Anders. Hawke honestly would kind of fancy her bc she loves a challenge and try to subtly tease her- unlike Cullen, though, Vivienne is savvy enough to know what Hawke's doing and it wouldn't amuse her one bit.

BONUS my Inquisitor: Finian would admire her, though perhaps he should not. Given his position Hawke is fairly respectful towards him- she likes him though and Approves of him as a friend for Varric. Their senses of humour mesh well; Finian is very laid-back so he can take a bit of teasing.

[belleropheon]

@admirelight

I understand that the blight and darkspawn are like the ultimate evil in Dragon age and that to stop it you can't really be noble or 'good' about it because you can't REASON with it but this post was more about how they tried to portray the people whose job it is to stop it as these noble knights in shining armor whose morality is superiorly just and not these fatalistic walking dead men that 1 have to basically become darkspawn lite to stop it. 2 can't or won't talk about how terrifying it actually is (becoming the thing you're sworn to destroy in the long run). 3 Even if one volunteers for the grey wardens the most you get from other Grey Wardens is "Are you sure?/ You don't know what you're asking/ Just know it isn't glamorous and you can never go back to how things were before".

It is basically a death cult that is the last chance for many rather..morally dubious people who get recruited and gives them 30 years give or take before they have to go underground and die fighting actuall monsters in dark caves.

The OG post I had was actually way longer and was about having to do terrible stuff for the greater good but it was too long imo so I cut that out since it was more on the Wardens and not the weird portrayel they got in Inquisition.

Uh it was basically how the lucky ones die during the Joining and that the Joining is the first and easiest step of the downward spiral your life is gonna become. Not to say a Warden is forever depressed and can't do good it's just that as a whole it is a terrible burden with a terrible end. Look at Duncan towards a Mahariel "this isn't a mercy" when they offer the 'cure' and how instead of disarming and talking to Jory he just went straight to stabbity stab. He threatened a Cousland who doesn't want to go with him basically telling them he won't help them escape if they don't join him. Duncan, arguably a morally good man, is extremely shady to get what he wants aka a Grey Warden. I think a lot of them have this resentment to their recruiter for not telling them wtf they were getting into.

In the previous games there wasn't a warden that was like the fantasy shining knight trope but in Inquisition they all seem to have this idea they are and everyone around them seem to line up to kiss them full on the lips. Here lies the Abyss should've gone more "fuck off, we're Grey Wardens. We use whatever to fight the blight" and less "Uwu we have to resort to such EVIL and CRUEL things as blood magic oh nooo how far we've fallen".

When Blackwall gave his pretty cool speech about how awesome and good the wardens are I expected one to go "tf you talking about man? Since when? Betty over there had to kill an entire tainted family and it was terrible but we'd do it again in a heartbeat"

..I may have used your reply to actually write the rest I had in mind lol

[fiend-streak]

Absolute worst ending, suicide far better. But there's one thing that makes me want to laugh. I wrote a fanfic 2 years ago. Well, "wrote" - I started it, never finished, 1st chapter is on ao3 (https://archiveofourown.org/works/29491563). Yeah, yeah, I'm bit ashamed here and there but... Let's just say I cured V in it, a "clinic" in Europe with advanced AI helped him. The AI Hyron restored V's brain from the scratch, drawback was memory loss. Everything connected to Mr. Blue Eyes obviously. Takemura delivered and cared for V. 2 months treatment, yadayada. Hanako was killed by Takemura - that was my way of doing justice for him plus I really wanted to woo him. I had 3/4 of the plan written somewhere. That's a long story short. Now, I do that new ending. V is fully cured, treatment was in Europe and lasted 2 years. Drawback is no cyberware. Ever. Used neural matrix AI for that. Now comes cherry on the top. Hanako is dead. Takemura is thought to be her murderer - he's not, but I find it funny when I think back to my fanfic, alright. It feels... odd. Not everything is the same, but holy damn fuck it's so similar it's laughable. ...well, maybe I ought to start playing jackpot or some shit. I almost nailed new game ending, 2 years before it was released.

Oh and... emm, Blackwall went insane during that big boxing fight. Gateway killed literally everyone in there, without being triggered. Probably a bug. Still wtf.

[savingthrcw]

may be used as a test muse page / 'only writing them if requested' muses page because I'm not making them a set of links like for the others but I'd love to write them: Lily Tabris, Ellana Lavellan and Solona Amell

okay but also I just want to say that I have a few other Dragon Age ladies that I love with all my heart, one of them being the city elf warrior Lily Tabris whom I'd love to write again, who was ferocious and too blunt and considered letting Denerim's human side burn (okay Alistair can stay close to her but he's on thin ice) (absolutely jumped on Zevran but also didn't know wtf to do when he got romantic first) (keeps the ring of the elf she was supposed to marry who died trying to uselessly save her when she was easily slaying the entire palace, it's a reminder that human nobles who are in charge of alienages should all be ripped to pieces). Her entire backstory is filled with things that are common triggers in rp so yeah. Complicated because she doesn't skirt away from the topics, she literally told the King she had just met that she had murdered a noble who had all intentions of r*ping her and her friends (see the triggering part) and left him speechless, that's the kind of person she is. Also a bit racist against humans, given the situation, but if one proves himself to be kind, like Alistair, she will not extend that to him, so maybe racist isn't the right word, maybe it's... prejudiced against a race that enslaves hers, but open to the fact that some humans have nothing to do with it? Difficult to get along with if you don't like people who are that blunt, and also won't keep to herself her disagreement. DESPITE EVERYTHING she still tries to help people, tries to save Connor (sends Morrigan after asking her if she can do it), saves the mages in the Circle, pushes Alistair to be king so he can make a change, kills Loghain herself. Later she'd be fighting for Elves rights all over Thedas. Very quiet and pissed off Warden Commander because Zevran apparently was busy elsewhere and when left by herself she reverts to grumpy as hell. Got the entire team to help. Will show up in DA2 to check on Anders despite him not being an elf because she's loyal to people who have fought with her. Will show up in DAI because she was contacted by Alistair who told her about weird Callings for all Wardens and wanted to look into it. There since Haven. LILY HEADCANONS.

Ellana Lavellan, Inquisitor, would write her if I could remember ALL the specific events of Inquisition and if I had gotten to know all characters in other gameplays but she's my one and only inquisitor. If I ever do this will be her only introduction: absolutely made me think of Buffy when telling Corypheus to f*ck off and basically making a mountain of snow fall on them, flirted with Dorian so hard before finding out the truth and deciding he was her best friend (they can flirt anyway) so he gets privileges, doesn't mention for one second her clan and her grief when it gets wiped out so people are Concerned about what's up, romanced Cullen (step away from the Lyrium, buddy), all cute with him which goes from awkward flirting to jumping his bones, made Varric best friend number two, Solan was best friend number three and she wants to save him but if she can't she's going to kill him and also god does she feel betrayed, took Cole under her wing, sided with mages because she's a Dalish elf mage okay, she's still trying to figure out if Cassandra likes her,

Blackwall's betrayal also hurt her but... eh. Could've been worse. She feels they all did sh*t in their pasts. Which blatantly means she did sh*t she told no one about. She still doesn't know if Cassandra likes her (she does). Gets a little too along with Iron Bull. She absolutely did sh*t in her past. She hasn't told anyone about that yet. Was kept in a Dalish-version of prison for being a tremendous assh*le who stole and started fights and a problem child, got kicked out, was given another chance with the conclave because an aunt who has a soft spot for her punk niece decides to bring her and show her she can be more than a little criminal, but then what happens next changes her, and all the responsibilities put on her made her attitude shift very quickly into responsible leader. Basically your typical 'trying to be heroic and do the right thing with mild sarcasm and complaints' hero who turns out to have a crazy past they hardly ever mention. She couldn't bond with Vivienne because there really wasn't much time. She didn't bond with Sera because she's not very prank-y and she's an elf who takes offense to anyone who has anything to say about elves. She accidentally hardened Leliana??? she thought Leliana was already like that?? ELLANA HEADCANONS.

Solona Amell, babe, human mage, she was having the time of her life even in the circle, didn't listen to a word they said about not wanting mages to have strong bonds with each other, is basically a puppy in human form, loves everything. Impossibly strong for no reason except that I used mods to play with her so she's like the angel of death or something, shakes a hand and all the enemies go down. she's basically Sandal in that aspect, all innocence and death. I may actually write her as a bonus character if someone wants some ridiculousness /unrealistic death power. Only wasn't killed during the Harrowing (quickest Harrowing ever) because she had no reason to use her full power before so the Circle doesn't know. She is 10000% creepy, because you know someone who can extend a hand and knock out/kill all enemies around her (and not lose a wink of sleep over murder in general) should not be acting all cute and sweet. Doesn't judge anyone, finds them all so curious and funny. human may be a stretch. Can also be used as occasional companion if we have threads with one of my other Wardens. To avoid ending the war and plots immediately, she can't constantly use her kill-all power but only once every 12 hours. SOLONA HEADCANONS.

My baby Neria from this blog in her official outfit

Elyssa Cousland, not writing her because there is not enough writing material: doesn't want to be anybody's hero, spends nearly the entire time covered in blood, she's just trying to avenge her entire family, she doesn't hardens the characters but real talk, Alistair is the one who un-hardens her (she marries him and makes them king and queen). May have flirted with Leliana to keep herself from thinking of Alistair and then things got awkward. Very close to Morrigan for no reason whatsoever. Way too pretty.

[shift-shaping]

Sorta weird how pushy Duncan is immediately in the human noble origin

[ceo-of-sloppy-men]

No because why is dai calling me out for kissing blackwall too much

“Evidently the beard does not bother you as much as I feared” just directly after a kiss and he just walks away

[togepies]

“I didn’t know you danced.” “I did once. In another life.”