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[JoeBoy101]

The facial animation seems noticeable better as well. The characters in Dragon Age (most of them anyway) don't give off that eerie mannequin feel like in Mass Effect and Bethesda games - a part of that is the high quality of the voice acting and how varied it is, but the characters also convey facial emotion a lot more effectively than in those other games.

I also noticed alot more use of facial animation too. Mass Effect had more physical body animations during conversation like shrugs and such, but DA shows more facial reactions and such from NPCs. Really like where they are heading with it. It especially gives your mute PC alot more personality.

 

[JoeBoy101]

Anyone know the max amount of party members you can have at one time? Is it 4?

4, and you are required all the time (I'm assuming, as it has been the case so far). So you choose three.

 

[Twilight Princess]

uggghhhhhhhhh, my copy's still on the way...

i read that origins has a gambit system, for clearing non boss mobs, can the game play itself if you set up the gambit system really well?

 

[LiK]

I thought Leilana was gonna be a healer cause she was from those priest dudes, but she turned out to be a rogue so I am mad at her and never use her >.< except to unlock stuff here and there.

i thought so, until you talk to her and learn about her background.

 

[TheUglyDrunk]

What is up with the specialty classes? I hit level 7 with my rogue last night, and I wasn't given the option to select one, do they require specific quest unlocks or something?

 

[mackloon]

...is there a respec option for your toons if you mess up on point placement? If so...what is the frequency and/or cost?

 

[Twilight Princess]

What is up with the specialty classes? I hit level 7 with my rogue last night, and I wasn't given the option to select one, do they require specific quest unlocks or something?

you need a trainer to teach you the specialization
http://dragonage.gulbsoft.de/doku.p...ons?DokuWiki=2c13823fe8368783dbd8441b57ae5baf

...is there a respec option for your toons if you mess up on point placement? If so...what is the frequency and/or cost?

i dont think you can respec...

 

[slayn]

What is up with the specialty classes? I hit level 7 with my rogue last night, and I wasn't given the option to select one, do they require specific quest unlocks or something?

You have to find someone to teach it to you. This far, I've noticed that companions will teach you their specialization. I also saw books for sale in a shop that would teach them. I haven't yet found how to become an assassin through

 

[Zeliard]

Anyone know if becoming a Blood Mage affects your party's feelings towards you?

 

[macfoshizzle]

i don't understand the whole profile thing that bioware says it links to your social.bioware profile. i read somewhere that whatever you do in DA will show up on your social.bioware profile including screenshots, etc.. can anybody tell me if this is live or it's still not out yet? i'm registered with social.bioware with my ea account, do i have to create a seperate bioware account?

 

[TheUglyDrunk]

You have to find someone to teach it to you. This far, I've noticed that companions will teach you their specialization. I also saw books for sale in a shop that would teach them. I haven't yet found how to become an assassin through

Ahhh, thanks for the heads up, I thought I'd hit a glitch or something. Now I'll be spending tonight hunting for a duellist or assassin...

 

[SlasherJPC]

Can you take screens shots on the console versions and I just don't know it? I was guessing this is a pc edition.

 

[dollartaco]

The ogre had taken out everybody but my rogue and Allistair. Its life was pretty low, so I said "fuck it" and charged. Imagine my surprise when my rogue kept running, jumped and stabbed it in the face.

 

[Zeliard]

I have the same problem. I'm chaotic good, acting and reacting to things the way I would in real life, and Alistair HATES the way I think while Morrigan loves it.

Here's an example. You know is the first town and you see the merchant man being harassed by a mob? He bought a bunch of supplies 2 weeks prior to Ferelden getting fucked up, and now is charging high prices for his items because he's got a small inventory. I personally don't see a problem with this, morally, as I think it's within his right to do that in such times. Because let's be realistic, stuff like that during times like the Blight does not come to convenience; that guy has to make a living too.

So I basically told the mob and the priest in charge of the mob to leave, because they're distracting him from his business and that if they were unable to match or sell items cheaper than him, they should fuck off.

Alistair was like,"HOW COULD YOU".

This game REALLY benefits from not having an alignment system. I'm starting to think its system is better than BG2's system which allowed a fair amount of honesty in your replies.

I did the exact same thing. I absolutely loved the dialogue options there too.

I really wish I could remember the exact wording (it's in the journal), but the exchange basically went like this:

Me: "You should go."

Woman: "So you're really going to side with him?"

Me: "That's right, now leave."

Woman: "You can't just let him get away with this, can you?"

Me: "Absolutely. Off you go."

The responses were so terse and amusing. :lol I'm not sure about the others but I distinctly remember that last one indeed being "absolutely, off you go". Made me laugh.

Got like an -11 rating from Alistair for it.

 

[luxarific]

...but the characters also convey facial emotion a lot more effectively than in those other games.

If you speak with Alistair at length re

Spoiler

Duncan's death

, you can see the emotions play out over his face in a very naturalistic way. Very impressive. The facial animation would be a failure, though, if the accompanying voice acting weren't so good. The voices are what sells it for me.

I still wish the player's character wasn't mute, but given the truly astonishing amounts of dialogue in the game*, I understand why they didn't record any of your lines.

Alistair's probably my favorite character in the game so far. I just love how he tells you really important stuff in such an off-hand manner, e.g. (REALLY BIG SPOILER HERE)

Spoiler

"Hey, just wanted to let you know, I'm the royal bastard. Well, let's get going.".

*I spent literally 30 minutes last night just babbling with Morrigen. I actually was happy when I exhausted all her dialogue options since I wanted to go fight something to get a break from all the talking. :lol

 

[Lostconfused]

I have the same problem. I'm chaotic good, acting and reacting to things the way I would in real life, and Alistair HATES the way I think while Morrigan loves it.

Here's an example. You know is the first town and you see the merchant man being harassed by a mob? He bought a bunch of supplies 2 weeks prior to Ferelden getting fucked up, and now is charging high prices for his items because he's got a small inventory. I personally don't see a problem with this, morally, as I think it's within his right to do that in such times. Because let's be realistic, stuff like that during times like the Blight does not come to convenience; that guy has to make a living too.

So I basically told the mob and the priest in charge of the mob to leave, because they're distracting him from his business and that if they were unable to match or sell items cheaper than him, they should fuck off.

Alistair was like,"HOW COULD YOU".

This game REALLY benefits from not having an alignment system. I'm starting to think its system is better than BG2's system which allowed a fair amount of honesty in your replies.

I love how people who are lawful evil think they are chaotic good. Although in 4th edition good is the new chaotic good.

 

[Zeliard]

Damn, dude. -11? I got -3.

I definitely got an -11 rating from Alistair somewhere in that village. Pretty sure it was there, but maybe it was elsewhere.

Also, it's hilarious how you can just

Spoiler

kill that vendor

after sending the other people away from him. I did that at first but I re-loaded because I figured he'd probably be

Spoiler

handy to have around

.

I've only reloaded two decisions so far. I'll stop, I promise.

I love how people who are lawful evil think they are chaotic good. Although in 4th edition good is the new chaotic good.

My party's more chaotic neutral, actually. No rules, no code, no worries. I do the occasional good deed though.

 

[Zzoram]

I'm between Chaotic Evil and Chaotic Neutral I believe. Basically I want my Rogue to be sneaky, selfish, but have some loyalty to family. I killed someone needlessly to take a key from him, then lied about why I did it.

 

[54-46!]

So.. coming right off Torchlight, is the loot indeed as great as op says it is? Can you replay dungeons and stuff like that too?

 

[Zeliard]

I'm between Chaotic Evil and Chaotic Neutral I believe. Basically I want my Rogue to be sneaky, selfish, but have some loyalty to family. I killed someone needlessly to take a key from him, then lied about why I did it.

What was the key for, though?

 

[Zzoram]

So.. coming right off Torchlight, is the loot indeed as great as op says it is? Can you replay dungeons and stuff like that too?

Yes you can grind if you want. The loot is good but it's not a ton of randomly generated stuff. It's a lot of hand-placed items, but there are many things (mainly stones used to upgrade weapons) that you have to farm specific enemy types for by replaying sections of dungeons.

 

[Zzoram]

What was the key for, though?

A chest that belonged to the mages. I'm going to loot it when it's unguarded.

 

[JayDubya]

As a frequent DM and armchair moralist, I would say that in D&D terms, stepping in to protect a merchant from a mob angry about his prices would be lawful. Stealing his goods would be chaotic. Buying his goods at the asking price and then selling them at a loss or giving them away would be good.

A chest that belonged to the mages. I'm going to loot it when it's unguarded.

Heh, totally didn't need to kill the guy.

But the cool thing about this game is how nested these encounters are. If you just offer to feed him for no reward, he'll take the food and basically just say thanks. :lol

 

[whatevermort]

Where the hell have I seen this face before? Actress??

Have you been spending time looking at pictures of weird pig-crow hybrid people? Because it's probably from there.

 

[Zzoram]

Mass Effect is $9.99 on Steam this weekend. I guess Bioware figured the Dragon Age hype could spill over to extra sales for their last game.

 

[Lostconfused]

As a frequent DM and armchair moralist, I would say that in D&D terms, stepping in to protect a merchant from a mob angry about his prices would be lawful. Stealing his goods would be chaotic. Buying his goods at the asking price and then selling them at a loss or giving them away would be good.

With a bit of intimidation you can persuade him to sell those goods at a normal price and no one was attacking the merchant. The merchant was offering to buy you off to stop people from bothering him.

Either way as i said in 4th edition they totally got rid of chaotic/lawful good, because nobody wants to be lawful and most people that pick it anyway act like idiots.

But that's not exactly an evil thing to do! It's rational!

The actions of the merchant were lawful evil. Only a lawful good character can really defend him and that is only because he isn't doing anything out right illegal.

 

[JayDubya]

But that's not exactly an evil thing to do! It's rational!

I would be inclined to agree; the merchant is going to need to go buy more things if he is to sell them - when next he goes to resupply, his costs will have risen as well.

With a bit of intimidation you can persuade him to sell those goods at a normal price and no one was attacking the merchant. The merchant was offering to buy you off to stop people from bothering him.

Well, I'll probably be playing around with that encounter in a few hours. Playing on Nightmare, just got through the initial Ostagar stuff and started the Warden initiation.

Either way as i said in 4th edition they totally got rid of chaotic/lawful good, because nobody wants to be lawful and most people that pick it anyway act like idiots.

Actually, they kept Lawful Good and Chaotic Evil. They ditched Lawful Evil and Chaotic Good, more or less folding them into the generic "Good" or "Evil."

Alignment's always been quite subjective and screwy, anyway, to some extent. The main reason it works in mainline D&D or Star Wars is that there is, an external, qualifiable source of objective good and objective evil.

 

[Snuggles]

I did the exact same thing. I absolutely loved the dialogue options there too.

I'm leaning towards good...like most of you guys I'm saying what I personally want to say rather than trying to create a good/evil character. I totally botched that situation with the merchant, I didn't approve of him taking advantage of the poor, sickly peasants in their time of need so I tried to get stern with him, thinking if I threatened to force him to leave that he would change his ways and lower his prices. Unfortunately, he just left and now the villagers have nothing because of me, what a backfire.

So, last time I played I was given an option in that town to let that murderer in a cage go...does that mean he'll be joining my crew? I feel like I shouldn't let him out but I'd like to expand my crew and see where it takes me.

 

[Zeliard]

A chest that belonged to the mages.

You are to be swiftly murdered, scoundrel.

As a frequent DM and armchair moralist, I would say that in D&D terms, stepping in to protect a merchant from a mob angry about his prices would be lawful. Stealing his goods would be chaotic. Buying his goods at the asking price and then selling them at a loss or giving them away would be good.

What if you drive the mob away and then extort the merchant for permanently lower prices, exclusive to you?

Although, I think I just asked, so I guess it wasn't really extortion. Bah. I'll pretend he was intimidated.

 

[luxarific]

i don't understand the whole profile thing that bioware says it links to your social.bioware profile. i read somewhere that whatever you do in DA will show up on your social.bioware profile including screenshots, etc.. can anybody tell me if this is live or it's still not out yet? i'm registered with social.bioware with my ea account, do i have to create a seperate bioware account?

It's up for me. Took about 12-14 hours after I started playing to show up though. I created an account at the social site to upload a character I'd made with the stand-alone character creator, so my account existed before launch (which might have helped with regard to how quickly my Xbox character showed up, since I think the servers are still working through the backlog of new accounts created since Tuesday). You can enter your Xbox Live tag during the process, so I haven't had the same problems connecting my social account with what I'm doing on the console as people playing the PC version.

I had a pre-existing EA account I made last year when Mirror's Edge came out and I used the same login/pw on the Social site when creating an account there. I experienced no issues between linking the EA account and Social site account - the process was transparent to me - so I'm guessing EA matched up my Live gamertag I entered on the Ea.com account last year with the same gamertag I entered when creating the Social site account.

 

[luxarific]

But that's not exactly an evil thing to do! It's rational!

I don't know. Think about how you feel when gas stations gouge on prices after hurricanes. I think it's evil (or at the least not good). Rational, but evil.

 

[Lostconfused]

I would be inclined to agree; the merchant is going to need to go buy more things if he is to sell them - when next he goes to resupply, his costs will have risen as well.

The merchant bought up all of his supplies in that down. And now he is selling them back at several times the price he got them at. When he goes to resupply his costs would be just as high as they were before.

Edit: Either way the actions of a chaotic good character would be to stop the merchant one way or another. Either by talking him into selling the goods to the people without gouging them or relieving him of said goods or his coin and then handing out back to the people.

 

[Zeliard]

Is simply driving the mob away and allowing the merchant to continue operating at high prices self-serving enough to be Lawful Evil? Seems moreso Lawful Neutral.

Spoiler

I threatened the priest woman at the monastery because she wouldn't release the prisoner.

:lol Alistair was pissed. RELOAD!

Ah yes! That's where the -11 from Alistair came from. :lol

Didn't reload that one. Fuck that woman.

 

[Y2Kev]

Is Alistair Flynn and Morrigan Chloe?

Also, when I was making my character, I couldn't see that I totally screwed up my cheekbones. I look great head on but like a total freak from the side. Ugh.

 

[PflargBlarg]

Another story from the ogre encounter. I was doing really well and then the tower guard got grabbed and pummeled to death. It all went to shit at that point with me and Alistair doing some good damage but both dying eventually. At that point I took control of the mage and was running around in circles until he recharged enough to throw out another spell.

So it ended with the mage running around, then stopping, turning, and blasting the ogre with fire blast (i.e. Burning Hands). That one attack took the ogre down. It was a pretty awesome ending to that fight, although no cool animation since it wasn't a bladed attack that took him down.

But yeah, the renaming of the basic spells kind of makes me chuckle.
Fire Blast = Burning Hands
Arcane Blast = Magic Missile

I assume it's because they're not actually using the D&D license on this game.

 

[Lostconfused]

Is simply driving the mob away and allowing the merchant to continue operating at high prices self-serving enough to be Lawful Evil? Seems moreso Lawful Neutral.

But if you are neutral you wouldn't take the side of the merchant or the people.

 

[Zeliard]

But if you are neutral you wouldn't take the side of the merchant or the people.

I dunno. I personally took the merchant's side but then I made him give me lower prices as compensation. Doesn't seem lawful, at least.

 

[JoeBoy101]

I'm leaning towards good...like most of you guys I'm saying what I personally want to say rather than trying to create a good/evil character. I totally botched that situation with the merchant, I didn't approve of him taking advantage of the poor, sickly peasants in their time of need so I tried to get stern with him, thinking if I threatened to force him to leave that he would change his ways and lower his prices. Unfortunately, he just left and now the villagers have nothing because of me, what a backfire.

So, last time I played I was given an option in that town to let that murderer in a cage go...does that mean he'll be joining my crew? I feel like I shouldn't let him out but I'd like to expand my crew and see where it takes me.

Actually

Spoiler

if you help Sten (dude in the cage), you can actually convince the Revered Mother to release him into your custody. This also gains you favor with Leilana as she thinks he shouldn't be caged and left to be killed by darkspawn. He interests me from the severe nature of his crime, which he freely admits, and the conviction he has to receive atonement through death. Dude seems to have total regret for his actions in a non-emotional way. As a party member, he's a 2-Handed Spec'd Warrior.

 

[Lostconfused]

I don't see the comparison. This is a country (continent? I haven't read the codex yet) overtaken by a horde of monsters. Unlike hurricanes, they can go anywhere they please to wage war; they're not on any set path. And unlike hurricanes, these people can't back to their homes and constantly fear for their safety.

With hurricanes you'll lose power, have some property damage, but it's nowhere close to having an onslaught of demon spawn come to kill you.

No the comparison is perfectly fine. The country it self is not at war just yet. Most of it is still peaceful. There is only unrest in that small town because its local lord who would ensure peace, is no longer there. The lawlessness is limited only to that town for the time being.

I told him he was acting like an idiot. Felt good man.

Next time you see anyone broken up over death of their family, you should tell them they are being a slobbering baby.

 

[JoeBoy101]

I dunno. I personally took the merchant's side but then I made him give me lower prices as compensation. Doesn't seem lawful, at least.

Sure it was. Lawful was taking the merchant's side and enforcing order. The Neutral (borderline Evil) part was making him give you a discount for doing it.

 

[zombieshavebrains]

Yeah, she sucks dude.

But I didn't do that because it's not something I would in real life. All of my choices up till now, are things I truly feel opinionated about or what I'd do in real life. What'd you tell the guy yelping it was the end of the world outside the monastery? I told him he was acting like an idiot. Felt good man.

Yeah i've been doing kinda the same thing. I read all the dialogue choices and go "Hmm that's what i would most likely say." Only like 1 or 2 times have i not found something along those lines.

 

[Lostconfused]

Sure it was. Lawful was taking the merchant's side and enforcing order.

But no one was breaking any laws or creating a disturbance. If two people are having an argument in the street, you don't just go up to one of them and tell him to show off because they are disturbing the kings peace.

 

[Zeliard]

Actually

Spoiler

if you help Sten (dude in the cage), you can actually convince the Revered Mother to release him into your custody. This also gains you favor with Leilana as she thinks he shouldn't be caged and left to be killed by darkspawn. He interests me from the severe nature of his crime, which he freely admits, and the conviction he has to receive atonement through death. Dude seems to have total regret for his actions in a non-emotional way. As a party member, he's a 2-Handed Spec'd Warrior.

I'm intrigued by the brutality of his crime, too, but it really feels like it'll end up being the case that he was innocent and was at the scene of the crime because he was trying to help them, or something like that. If he is in fact completely guilty in actually comitting those acts (even if there are other circumstances involved), that would be ballsy and fucking awesome.

Yeah, she sucks dude.

But I didn't do that because it's not something I would in real life. All of my choices up till now, are things I truly feel opinionated about or what I'd do in real life. What'd you tell the guy yelping it was the end of the world outside the monastery? I told him he was acting like an idiot. Felt good man.

I can't play these games making choices like I would in real life because then I'd basically be kind and altruistic all the time, and that's just boring.

I usually prefer to play the exact opposite, so I almost always play evil. In this game, though, the choices aren't so plainly black-and-white and the dialogue is well-written enough that I've been picking a wide variety of dialogue options. It all depends on how I'm feeling at the time in videogame terms (i.e. do I want to kill this motherfucker right now or not). Feels very... freeing.

Sure it was. Lawful was taking the merchant's side and enforcing order. The Neutral (borderline Evil) part was making him give you a discount for doing it.

I look at it as one big decision, since the discount is directly related to the fact that I drove the mob away.

 

[Alex]

Is Alistair Flynn and Morrigan Chloe?

Also, when I was making my character, I couldn't see that I totally screwed up my cheekbones. I look great head on but like a total freak from the side. Ugh.

The Dwarven King, Aeducan, is Sully.

 

[Lostconfused]

There's a difference between being broken from the death of your family and acting like fucking Chicken Little.

Problem is that Chicken Little is wrong unlike that man. I mean the town gets wiped out as soon as you leave.

I'm intrigued by the brutality of his crime, too, but it really feels like it'll end up being the case that he was innocent and was at the scene of the crime because he was trying to help them, or something like that. If he is in fact completely guilty in actually comitting those acts (even if there are other circumstances involved), that would be ballsy and fucking awesome.

I assumed that he just went berserk and killed all of them.

 

[MirageDwarf]

This will be easily more than 70-80 hrs game for me.


I agree with others that statistics for spells and skills should be displayed. It will make great game even better. I'm 99.99% sure it's there but game is not exposing it. PC mods FTW!!!

 

[DietRob]

This will be easily more than 70-80 hrs game for me.


I agree with others that statistics for spells and skills should be displayed. It will make great game even better. I'm 99.99% sure it's there but game is not exposing it. PC mods FTW!!!

Yea I'm already about 10 hours in and looking at others posts I'm not very far at all. This will probably close to a 90-100 hour game for me. I've also been keeping my eye on the bioware social board. They have really nice section for mods some people have already posted some prelim ideas and stuff they are working on. It's going to be epic watch and see.

 

[Zeliard]

Wow, nice unmarked spoiler.

 

[Flib]

goddamit screw you for the spoiler

 

[laserbeam]

City Elf origin story is pretty awesome in a totally dark way. I really dig the fact that while all your potential characters are heros you dont have the whole picture perfect background etc