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Dragon Age: Origins |OT| Letting The Fade fade out of memory

G

Gvaz

Banned
Yeah they cut the elf mage part, elves can be mages but outside of the magi which is human mostly. Basically everyone else is apostles
 
N

Nelo Ice

Banned
so the ultimate edition of this is $7.50 on d2d right now and im thinking about picking it up, but what are some must have mods? and any tips on what character to make?
 
Dice

Dice

Pokémon Parentage Conspiracy Theorist
First off, you must always use the top-down camera in battle. Trust me on this.

Secondly, I'll leave it to you to figure out how to work compatibility between some of these. Their descriptions on Dragon Age Nexus most often explain how to work it out. If you want to use all of them, you may need both DAO-modmanager and DAmodder. I have used both and I prefer the former, but sometimes a mod is made specifically for the latter.

Top priority (at least for me) is the FtG UI Mod to make things more readable at 1080p.

The other stuff I have are basically cheats because I already played most of it on consoles and didn't want to mess with the bullshit. If you want things to be more casual, there is a nice respecialization mod to take the stress out of choosing skills, an expanded inventory mod if you're more used to JRPGs or just want to loot everything with less trips, an extra dog slot mod to always have him with you in addition to your party, lock bash is a surprisingly functional and dynamic mod, or if you want the most blatant cheating, there is a mod to use the console to add points.

For cosmetic changes, Natural Bodies is hilarious/creepy in how extensive/popular it is, but you also have to admire the professional work that went into it, and you do end up with more realistic models. Pineappletree's Vibrant Colors lets you make your hair any crazy color you want, though my character is more natural, and then a popular mod for More Hairstyles since Bioware sucks at that. The Universal Dye Kit takes a bit of work but lets you color several armors, and speaking of armor there is a no hemlet hack since most of them are butt ugly and you want to see that beautiful hair you made, and Bidelles Cosmetics gives you new eye and skin complexion options.

For relationship options there is Equal Love to allow any relationship with any character no matter your gender, or Polygamey to allow that plus multiple romances at once. The same person who made that also made MetaGame Items which have various effects, one of which lets you reclass any character, so you can have the friends you want with you always while also serving the battle techniques you want. Then... creepier than Natural Bodies... is the Better Sex Cutscenes and more options at the Pearl mods, and boy do they go all-out.

I personally don't like JB3textures because it just looks like he ran the old textures through a sharpening effect and it's unnatural and awful. I would also recommend against using Skip the Fade if it is your first time playing through the game, but do look up what the Fade is and be ready for it, since it is a long detour.

As for what kind of character to make, you really can do however you want. There is no advantage any which way you go, and with the respec mod you can completely change everything on a whim, so if you don't like the way the play style is going with the class you picked, just change it. I don't know why some people have such strong principles against this sort of thing. To me there is a difference between challenge and needless toil. If there are mods to let you still get one while skipping the other, why not? Though, I'm not even about getting a challenge in an RPG anyway. As long as battle dynamics are varied and fun, an outright slaughter is a fun slaughter.
 
N

Nelo Ice

Banned
Dice said:
First off, you must always use the top-down camera in battle. Trust me on this.

Secondly, I'll leave it to you to figure out how to work compatibility between some of these. Their descriptions on Dragon Age Nexus most often explain how to work it out. If you want to use all of them, you may need both DAO-modmanager and DAmodder. I have used both and I prefer the former, but sometimes a mod is made specifically for the latter.

Top priority (at least for me) is the FtG UI Mod to make things more readable at 1080p.

The other stuff I have are basically cheats because I already played most of it on consoles and didn't want to mess with the bullshit. If you want things to be more casual, there is a nice respecialization mod to take the stress out of choosing skills, an expanded inventory mod if you're more used to JRPGs or just want to loot everything with less trips, an extra dog slot mod to always have him with you in addition to your party, lock bash is a surprisingly functional and dynamic mod, or if you want the most blatant cheating, there is a mod to use the console to add points.

For cosmetic changes, Natural Bodies is hilarious/creepy in how extensive/popular it is, but you also have to admire the professional work that went into it, and you do end up with more realistic models. Pineappletree's Vibrant Colors lets you make your hair any crazy color you want, though my character is more natural, and then a popular mod for More Hairstyles since Bioware sucks at that. The Universal Dye Kit takes a bit of work but lets you color several armors, and speaking of armor there is a no hemlet hack since most of them are butt ugly and you want to see that beautiful hair you made, and Bidelles Cosmetics gives you new eye and skin complexion options.

For relationship options there is Equal Love to allow any relationship with any character no matter your gender, or Polygamey to allow that plus multiple romances at once. The same person who made that also made MetaGame Items which have various effects, one of which lets you reclass any character, so you can have the friends you want with you always while also serving the battle techniques you want. Then... creepier than Natural Bodies... is the Better Sex Cutscenes and more options at the Pearl mods, and boy do they go all-out.

I personally don't like JB3textures because it just looks like he ran the old textures through a sharpening effect and it's unnatural and awful. I would also recommend against using Skip the Fade if it is your first time playing through the game, but do look up what the Fade is and be ready for it, since it is a long detour.

As for what kind of character to make, you really can do however you want. There is no advantage any which way you go, and with the respec mod you can completely change everything on a whim, so if you don't like the way the play style is going with the class you picked, just change it. I don't know why some people have such strong principles against this sort of thing. To me there is a difference between challenge and needless toil. If there are mods to let you still get one while skipping the other, why not? Though, I'm not even about getting a challenge in an RPG anyway. As long as battle dynamics are varied and fun, an outright slaughter is a fun slaughter.
Click to expand...

thanks for the help! finally decided to pick it up and redeemed it on origin. glad to see i can launch it just fine on steam without origin running. also cant believe the game is 27 freaking gigs!
 
Y

Y2Kev

TLG Fan Caretaker Est. 2009
I played these games in reverse order. 2 first to completion, then 1 to completion.

Man, 2 is such a sack of shit!
 
S

shiroryu

Member
Nelo Ice said:
thanks for the help! finally decided to pick it up and redeemed it on origin. glad to see i can launch it just fine on steam without origin running. also cant believe the game is 27 freaking gigs!
Click to expand...

Also try out the latest Combat Tweaks mod from DANexus; it fixes a lot of broken effects in vanilla DA:O and adds some tweaks to make the combat more challenging.
 
N

Neki

Member
Got this off the amazon sale, and my god, getting all the DLC to work took a couple of hours. How I love the Bioware store and EA. Only mod I have downloaded right now is Skip The Fade. Does the Combat Tweaks mod fix computer archers sucking in DA because of how haste worked? The other mods that I look like I might need was the re-specialization one, and the inventory one.

I'm kinda reluctant to use the combat tweaks one because it sounds like it changes the original game play by a lot, not sure if I want that. I have so many mods downloaded, not sure if I'm actually playing DA:O anymore, lol.
 
AgentP

AgentP

Thinks mods influence posters politics. Promoted to QAnon Editor.
I just picked up ultimate version for $13 to cleanse my pallet for western RPGs from Skyrim. I made a mage. There is so much DLC, any opinion as to the order you play it?
 
H

HadesGigas

Member
AgentP said:
I just picked up ultimate version for $13 to cleanse my pallet for western RPGs from Skyrim. I made a mage. There is so much DLC, any opinion as to the order you play it?
Click to expand...

Warden's Keep and The Stone Prisoner should be done as early as you can. Since you get a place to store your excess loot and a new character from them.

Leliana's Song after you've finished Leliana's sidequests in your game.

Awakening and Witch Hunt are post-ending. (Darkspawn Chronicles too I guess, but that's pretty awful)
 
W

windz

Member
I miss you, DA:O. I remember playing through 2 and thinking "I wonder what area I will go to next" after completing an area....every time....

yeah....about that :(
 
AgentP

AgentP

Thinks mods influence posters politics. Promoted to QAnon Editor.
HadesGigas said:
Warden's Keep and The Stone Prisoner should be done as early as you can. Since you get a place to store your excess loot and a new character from them.

Leliana's Song after you've finished Leliana's sidequests in your game.

Awakening and Witch Hunt are post-ending. (Darkspawn Chronicles too I guess, but that's pretty awful)
Click to expand...

Thanks for the suggestions. What does "can" mean? Like now, or at a certain level?
 
S

Sigfodr

Member
Totally bringing up an old thread here, but I guess it's worth mentioning that the bundle of Ultimate Edition and DA2 are available digitally from Amazon for $10 this week.
 
L

LadyRiven

Member
If I could experience any game for the first time all over again, it'd be Origins. I played it for the first time last year and I never wanted it to end. I made my game as long as humanly possible. Such good memories. I feel sad not knowing if I'll ever have an experience like it again!
 
T

The Frankman

Banned
I just picked up this game a week or two ago for PC, what essential mods that aren't blatant cheats are there that I should look at? I've seen a few on the site mentioned above (Dragon Age Nexus). This is what I have that I'll DL so far:

EDIT:

DAO-modmanager - - http://dragonage.nexusmods.com/mods/277 - Seems like a good install based on the managers.
FtG UI Mod - More Readable Fonts and UI - http://dragonage.nexusmods.com/mods/73 - Recommended
Character Respecialization - http://dragonage.nexusmods.com/mods/14 - Must-have.
JB3textures - http://dragonage.nexusmods.com/mods/15/ - I like how it looks, probably will download it. Very convoluted install though.
Morrigan Restoration Patch Dialog Fixpack - http://dragonage.nexusmods.com/mods/1120 - Will DL
Grey Wardens of Ferelden - http://dragonage.nexusmods.com/mods/3258 - Since I'll NEVER play DA2, might as well have the outfits.
Pineappletree s Vibrant Colors - http://dragonage.nexusmods.com/mods/153 - Seems like a must-have.
 
T

Thunder Monkey

Banned
So since my disc drive is dead I downloaded this for $15.

Easily worth $40. Maybe more. I've already beaten it once and starting a second play through.

I really like the mechanics, and on occasion this game looks great even on the Xbox. Though those PC mods are impressive. Can't say I'm a big fan of how the weapons drawn run animation translates to some models. My hawty human rogue chick looked so damn weird running with her daggers.

Can't stress how much I enjoyed the pseudo realtime fighting, and the chance for stats again.
 
L

Ledsen

Member
TurkishEmperor said:
I might get this game. Does the pc version have console layout if you play it with a controller?
Click to expand...

You can't play it with a controller.

The Frankman said:
I just picked up this game a week or two ago for PC, what essential mods that aren't blatant cheats are there that I should look at? I've seen a few on the site mentioned above (Dragon Age Nexus). This is what I have that I'll DL so far:

EDIT:
Click to expand...

I only consider a few mods worth using on a first playthrough:

- UI mod

- Morrigan Restoration

- The Morrigan portion of the http://dragonage.nexusmods.com/mods/435.
Makes Morrigan look like she does in the CG trailers.

The teeth mods, "Redesigned mod" and other graphic mods I would not use, especially not on a first playthrough.
The game (unlike, say, Oblivion or Fallout 3) looks great with the default graphics and those mods, like most texture mods for games, are typically not made by professional artists that know how to match colors, materials, level of detail etc to fit with the overall look of the world.
 
A

AlimNassor

Banned
Speevy said:
Oh, and concerning difficulty:

Some fights are completely ruined by having the game on casual. If you plan on taking on
the high dragon,
turn it to normal. Otherwise that boss just sits there and lets you kill it. At least it did for me.
Click to expand...

I disagree, maybe your game was bugged. But even on casual
The High Dragon
Was hard as hell. I couldn't do it on anything above casual without dieing too quickly.
 
T

Thunder Monkey

Banned
I'm not sure if this is a repeatable glitch (I'll get back to you guys on that) but I loaded up one of my saves at Ostagar, just after becoming a grey warden walking down toward the king to start up the Ishal quest. And I was pressing forward on the analog stick, well the character after some black screen delay with HUD apparent appears behind the king. When I walk to the king it has the exclamation mark and important character text so I selected him. This shot me back to me and Duncan standing in a sea of blue as he introduces me to Ostagar and tells me to find Alistair. I skip through that dialog and I can walk in the blue.

There's still a degree of collision going on and I walk though a hillside and realize (as things pop-in) that I'm about walking above the treetops just below the central Ostagar hub. I walk around, eventually my character falls to the ground below... well parts of it. And I continue to look around. Some of the texture work in places you aren't supposed to see is just dreadful. Talking transparencies with dithering that would make the GCN blush. I could count the pixels on some of those trees down below... if they weren't obviously just scaled down creating that dithery look.

Then as I was walking around I think my character got hung up on some geometry or something so I had to reload. But still. Always fun to break a game.
 
Raptomex

Raptomex

Member
So I got the PC version of this game a year or so ago now and I found it extremely difficult. Keep in mind I've never had a head for strategy and tactics but I did like what I played. I just got to a point where my entire party would get demolished. I'm thinking of giving this another shot. Any tips? I've read having a couple of mages can really help.
 
A

AlimNassor

Banned
Finally beat it after putting it off for so long. The Arch Demon was fucking hard. I wasn't expecting it spam darkspawn, alphas and shrieks everywhere and it hit pretty hard and had high HP.

Awakening was pretty good. I liked Anders, and Sigurn, all the party members were pretty cool.

Golems of Arm was okay. The harvester was a fucking horrible monster that still gives me nightmares. "25% HP! SUMMON TONS OF BOSS LEVEL MONSTERS"!


Witch Hunt was pure shit on a stick.
 
Portugeezer

Portugeezer

Member
Does SweetFX work with this game? I can't seem to get it working and it seems like a game that would benefit from it.

Edit: never mind, turns out you have to disable the games anti aliasing for SweetFX to work.
 
F

Firebrand

Member
Just went back and finished DA:O after not playing it for about a year, once I got out of the
Deep Roads
the game became fun again. So, itching for a bit more I thought I'd move onto the expansion but I'm a bit disappointed with how they handled imports.

(DA:O base game spoilers)
I decided to sacrifice my character at the end, and that ending was really satisfying. However, there's apparantely no way to play the Orlesian warden in the expansion _and_ keep my major choices; either I start a new guy and get stuck with whatever canon they've decided, or I import my save data and she's now mysteriously alive. Don't know if they change some details or there'll be continuity errors, codex still says I turned down Morrigan, Alistair is king and Loghain died at the Landsmeet.

Kinda wanted to keep playing but I'm stuck until I can make a decision :p I guess the compromise is to go back and pick a different ending even if it's a bit out of character.

edit:
After thinking about it and looking for alternate solutions, I think I'll just replay the last fight and accept Alistair's sacrifice if he insists, play Awakenings that way, and for future games use the pre-Awakenings save for importing.

Apologies for the wall of black bars, but I think it's better to be safe than sorry even if it's an old game.
 
Red Mage

Red Mage

Member
As this is my first WRPG, have any advice for someone who is used to JRPGs? I'm currently playing an elf rogue. (PS3 btw, so no mod suggestions, thanks). I do like how I could give those one guards poisoned wine in the city elf prelude. I hope there are plenty of such options as I play.

BTW, can you heal your companions without switching to them or using a tactic? Also, does the open/close option not work on the PS3 version? Mine keeps requiring I hold the L2 button, no matter what I have set on the menu screen.
 
N

Necrovex

Member
Mod question!

I want to play as a human mage, but I do not want to go through the mage origin story. Is there a mod available that allows me to alter that storyline to the noble origin?
 
T

TharpDaddy

Member
So i just picked the Ultimate Edition up on Steam, and i'm going to finally try to play through it in it's entirety since Dragon Age 3 is coming out this year. Before i do so, are there any mods that are considered really good or essential for the game?
 
Dries

Dries

Member
TharpDaddy said:
So i just picked the Ultimate Edition up on Steam, and i'm going to finally try to play through it in it's entirety since Dragon Age 3 is coming out this year. Before i do so, are there any mods that are considered really good or essential for the game?
Click to expand...

Quoted and kicked because I'm in the same situation. So, any mod reccomendations?
 
H

HadesGigas

Member
Dries said:
Quoted and kicked because I'm in the same situation. So, any mod reccomendations?
Click to expand...

I played through it recently, heres most of what I used. A lot of small things that you might or might not find pointless, then two bigger "change the way everything looks" mods:

Awakening Silverite Mines bugfix (Fixes a bug where you could lose equipped items in DA Awakening): http://www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/1762/?
Expanded inventory (125 inventory from the start instead of having to hunt around for backpacks all over the world): http://www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/23/?
Extended dog talents (gives the mabari a few new things it can learn, since it has so much less compared to everyone else): http://www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/1361/?
Extra dog slot (The mabari is summonable like in DA2 instead of taking a character slot): http://www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/664/?
FTG UI (Fonts aren't so tiny): http://www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/73
Isabela for Origins (DA2 look for Isabela): http://www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/4133/?
Morrigan restoration patch (restores some dialogue with Morrigan that was cut from the game): http://www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/1120/?
Quartermaster Tolby (item storage at your camp): http://www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/207
Resized Shale (Shale is ...bigger): http://www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/1477
Retextured Shale (HD Shale): http://www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/823
Those Who Speak - Sten (Revamped Sten to look less generic and apparently like he did in a comic?) http://www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/4168/?
Universal voices (Race restriction for player voice removed in character creator): http://www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/1512

JB3Textures (HD retextures): http://www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/15/?
Improved Atmosphere (Adds a lot of background things, restores some missing content, some new content): http://www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/577/?

I had some issues in Denerim since the game struggles when it starts using what it thinks is too much ram and that's the biggest most populated part of the game.
 
Dries

Dries

Member
HadesGigas said:
I played through it recently, heres most of what I used. A lot of small things that you might or might not find pointless, then two bigger "change the way everything looks" mods:

Awakening Silverite Mines bugfix (Fixes a bug where you could lose equipped items in DA Awakening): http://www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/1762/?
Expanded inventory (125 inventory from the start instead of having to hunt around for backpacks all over the world): http://www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/23/?
Extended dog talents (gives the mabari a few new things it can learn, since it has so much less compared to everyone else): http://www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/1361/?
Extra dog slot (The mabari is summonable like in DA2 instead of taking a character slot): http://www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/664/?
FTG UI (Fonts aren't so tiny): http://www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/73
Isabela for Origins (DA2 look for Isabela): http://www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/4133/?
Morrigan restoration patch (restores some dialogue with Morrigan that was cut from the game): http://www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/1120/?
Quartermaster Tolby (item storage at your camp): http://www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/207
Resized Shale (Shale is ...bigger): http://www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/1477
Retextured Shale (HD Shale): http://www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/823
Those Who Speak - Sten (Revamped Sten to look less generic and apparently like he did in a comic?) http://www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/4168/?
Universal voices (Race restriction for player voice removed in character creator): http://www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/1512

JB3Textures (HD retextures): http://www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/15/?
Improved Atmosphere (Adds a lot of background things, restores some missing content, some new content): http://www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/577/?

I had some issues in Denerim since the game struggles when it starts using what it thinks is too much ram and that's the biggest most populated part of the game.
Click to expand...

Thanks! I'm rolling a Rogue btw, and not putting any points in Strength, cause I'll be getting "Lethality" coupled with a high Cunning. Will I be in trouble though if my Strength stays at 10 the whole game?
 
S

Skux

Member
Finally finished this epic 40 hour yarn. Fantastic game. The intricacy of the Landsmeet and ending and its crazy number of outcomes is particularly well orchestrated.

I wanted as close to a vanilla playthrough as possible, just fixing the bugs and not touching the core gameplay, so I used many mods listed here and here.

Highly recommended

- Dragon Age Rules Fixpack - heaps of combat fixes
- Qwinn's Unofficial DAO Fixpack - lots of quest fixes. This and the Rules Fixpack are the two best ones I think
- Advanced Tactics - expands the Tactics rules and conditions to be more flexible, adding in common sense things like auto-reviving dead allies in battle
- ZDF Dialog Fix
- Morrigan Restoration Patch Dialog Fixpack - restores a lot of dialogue and banter that is fully voiced but either due to bugs or developer choice, wasn't included in the game
- Unobtainable Items Bugfixes
- Dialogue Fixes

Other minor fixes

- A Lost Nug quest fix
- Advanced Tactics Clustered Tactics Condition Fix (a further fix for the Advanced Tactics mod)
- Damage Statistics Fix
- Tiny Fixes
- MADD gift guide - just to save the trouble of going to the Wiki to see who likes a gift

Minor cosmetic fixes

- White Teeth
- Dwarf Proportions fix - fixes the ridiculously long dwaf female arms
- Elf Proportions Fix
- Human Proportions Fix

Note that the Qwinn's fixpack can break your story with a particular outcome at the Landsmeet - more info here. (spoilers). It is recommended to deactivate the mod and then force load, complete the Landsmeet, then you can activate the mod again.
 
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