Dragon Age Origins discussion...

I finished my first playthrough at 95 hours on normal difficulty. 100% of the world explored and somehwere over 75% of side quests completed (probably around 90%).

It's a great game and even though it was a long game, I find myself thinking about what class I'm going to playthrough next, although I think I will wait until there is some more content available.
 
WabeWalker said:
I just can't believe how badly I'm fighting this game.

I feel like I 'have' to play this thing (simply because I spent five years waiting for it), but it's becoming a real struggle. I'm doing the circle of magi quest right now, and I'm caught in The Fade. My party isn't with me anymore, and I'm just wandering around solo. It's unbearably tedious. I have no desire to continue even, and I'm even thinking about bailing on this.

This is exactly how the game started for me as well - in The Fade.

Jesus, I can't believe I'm saying this, but this game is the biggest disappointment of the year for me. Some people are saying this is their game of the year, which is baffling to me, since many of these people claim not to have liked Neverwinter Nights 2? Side by side, the gameplay is virtually identical?

I'm a good 25 hours into this thing now, and I've not once seen anything that really blew me away. These confined areas that define Bioware games aren't working for me anymore. After the freedoms of Oblivion and Fallout 3 this feels like a step backwards.

When I look at all the titles that amazed me this year, I'm not even sure I'd put Dragon Age on my top 10 list?

Also, I was one of the people who kept on saying that in DA you're going to have to pause your game a lot in order to strategize - wow, am I ever surprised to discover that I'm finding all the pausing to be kind of tedious. Games like Mass Effect are just so much more immediate. You're exploring the world and everything is happening in real time. It's just more fun. What worked for me ten years ago isn't working for me today, and I'm really, really surprised by that.

I now find myself looking forward to Mass Effect 2 in a way that I wasn't previously.

I spent the entire summer playing Drakensang, which I loved, and then after that I played Risen, which just blew me away. I'd put DA third after both of those games.
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Then it seems you need to know yourself better.

The game was meant to be paused frequently. This isn't a button mashing action rpg. Having to pause and think about what combos may work better in combat is more rewarding so far in my opinion. Theres a few parts where I've had to reload about 5 times because what I thought was a good plan of attack turned out not to be.

The part where your at is not very tedious. The only thing tedious is if you want to make sure you got all the +stat bonuses you can find in that part. The rest of it is pretty straightforward.

I don't understand why people keep comparing this to Oblivion, Fallout 3 or Mass Effect. The only similarities are that they are some form of RPG. It's apples and oranges, you cant directly compare. It just doesn't work out.
 
Samson4EiT said:
Then it seems you need to know yourself better.

The game was meant to be paused frequently. This isn't a button mashing action rpg. Having to pause and think about what combos may work better in combat is more rewarding so far in my opinion. Theres a few parts where I've had to reload about 5 times because what I thought was a good plan of attack turned out not to be.

The part where your at is not very tedious. The only thing tedious is if you want to make sure you got all the +stat bonuses you can find in that part. The rest of it is pretty straightforward.

I don't understand why people keep comparing this to Oblivion, Fallout 3 or Mass Effect. The only similarities are that they are some form of RPG. It's apples and oranges, you cant directly compare. It just doesn't work out.
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You've misunderstood me.

I realize that the game is meant to be paused all the time. I was just commenting that a decade ago I thought nothing of pausing, and actually enjoyed it, but that today it just takes me out of the game. Believe me when I say that I thought I would've been the last person to have written that comment.

The problem here is that I have to continually pause the game to issue orders to my people, or else they end up dying, except that the game itself isn't all that challenging. It's simply that there's no way to queue up orders. Queueing up orders, I would say, is paramount to success in this game, and it's baffling to me how this feature was left out. Mike Laidlaw's explanation that 'combat is so dynamic that it would be a waste to queue up orders' isn't true at all. In 95% of the battles I'm doing the same thing over and over again. A simple queue slot would've solved this problem.

As far as the Fallout 3, Mass Effect, Oblivion comparisons are concerned, well, they are legitimate actually: why was I drawn to Dragon Age - because I love role-playing games period. I'll have a discussion with anybody about a role-playing game. Doesn't matter if it's open world, confined world, classic RPG, or action RPG, as long as it's an RPG I'm down for it. It's fair enough to compare the games since what we're after here is a great RPG experience.

The one thing that's starting to get a bit annoying though is the way some people are begging the question whenever somebody else advances the idea that maybe it's time that Bioware created an open-world RPG. These people will say, but Bioware doesn't create open world games. Yeah, that's the point - maybe they should. Maybe these confined worlds are getting to be just a little bit too confined? This game, imo, would've been so much more if it HAD been an open-world game.

Ah well, it's just a game. Not going to get my curls in an uproar over this. :)
 
WabeWalker said:
The problem here is that I have to continually pause the game to issue orders to my people, or else they end up dying,
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Could always work on making decent strategies for them to follow when on autopilot.

The tactics screen can account for plenty of possibilities, and getting slots there isn't that hard with just a few skill points spent to open em up.

I've got a solid team now on my second playthrough and I rarely need to pause and fiddle with anything. Took some work to get the tactics set, but now that I do, its a lot easier.

For me it's been more like an interactive movie of sorts. It's not perfect but I'm liking it a whole lot.
 
Yeah spending a little bit of time tweaking tactics can go a long way. I was over at a friends last night and we played off and on but I noticed his party members were acting pretty stupidly and a lot of times a character of his would die in normal combat.

So I spent 20 mins. to look over their tactics and changed them up, the result? he can go through normal battles pretty much without pausing or doing any inputs. I made his character auto-attack only to see how well the party functioned, they plowed through groups with me just watching.
 
Okay, I'm going to say it, since nobody else has.

The so-called 'tactics' are Bioware's attempt at creating a game in which you don't have to pause the game and queue up orders. And why did Bioware do this? Folks, this is a decision to please the console crowd, plain and simple. This decision was done to make it so that you could play the game in real time.

Unfortunately, it doesn't work. But more importantly, why do I care? Is this supposed to be rewarding - going into a menu and fussing and fiddling with a bunch of menu drop-downs? I don't find that to be engaging in any way whatsoever. I want to play an RPG, not spend half my time fussing about with a string of menu commands.

The system in NWN 2 was so much easier. It just doesn't make sense for Bioware not to allow us to queue orders. I'm still trying to figure out if there's a pause-at-the-end-of-every-round feature. At least that should be in there?

In my opinion, Bioware has tried to please two separate groups of people here, with mixed results. RPG of the decade? It's not even the RPG of the year for me.

Ah well, but it's only a game. No need to spend too much time discussing this. :)
 
The game is great. I just finished it yesterday. The AI is tough some of the fights are really stupid difficult.Even on easy mode the game can get very challenging. It would have been nice to queue orders up tho.
 
started a human noble story a few days back, found the story/development to be pathetic compared to the witcher and mass effect. not really sure if i want to bother with this unnatural pausing battle system because the story just didn't get me.
 
oh please open world. fall out 3 sucked as an rpg, as did oblivion. with the exception of gothic 1 ,2 and risen most open world rpgs have sucked, and play far more like GTA than an actual rpg. Give me mass effect, witcher, dragon age over oblivion any time.
 
ikarinokami said:
oh please open world. fall out 3 sucked as an rpg, as did oblivion. with the exception of gothic 1 ,2 and risen most open world rpgs have sucked, and play far more like GTA than an actual rpg. Give me mass effect, witcher, dragon age over oblivion any time.
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Yo ikarinokami, I’m really happy for you. Imma let you finish. But Morrowind is the best sandbox RPG of all time.
 
The thing that bothers me is that the moment I select a single character to issue a command w/o pausing, the characters I delected, just go to default tactics. I wish there was a way that I could issue a command to attack a certain enemy, then be able to de-select them for a few momemts to do somethign else w/o pausing. You could do this in BG/IWD series just fine. I always had AI off so non-selected party members would just keep attack the target until it's dead or I told them something else to do.
 
Am I the only one who likes BOTH the open sandbox AND linear stories? Years ago, I got tired of linear games. Then I played the open sandbox and loved them. Then I got tired of open sandbox style. So I played linear games. Now... I think they both have their strengths and are fun.

I think the tactics thing (no matter how imperfect it might be) is a step in the right direction as far as design principle. Companions should have a mind of their own. Teaching them a few tactics to follow is how you should control them.

My only complaint is that I wish the controls where more like Oblivion or any 3rd person 'FPS'-RPG. Actually better yet, controls like Mount & Blade or Dark Messiah. I don't like the point and click feel. I like to feel in control of my swings, as I trust my companions will do their best given the pre-battle orders I give them.

Next play through, I might try to see if I can try normal skill level with no potions, no pausing, and no party member control. That sounds fun.
 
bigdogchris said:
The thing that bothers me is that the moment I select a single character to issue a command w/o pausing, the characters I delected, just go to default tactics. I wish there was a way that I could issue a command to attack a certain enemy, then be able to de-select them for a few momemts to do somethign else w/o pausing. You could do this in BG/IWD series just fine. I always had AI off so non-selected party members would just keep attack the target until it's dead or I told them something else to do.
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You can set them to always attack your target... though sometimes you might want them to attack someone else.
 
Am I the only one who likes BOTH the open sandbox AND linear stories? Years ago, I got tired of linear games. Then I played the open sandbox and loved them. Then I got tired of open sandbox style. So I played linear games. Now... I think they both have their strengths and are fun.
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I think the majority of people will like a game if it's fun. It's possible for both types to be fun. But the most vocal people are the people who don't like one or the other.
 
Parmenides said:
Am I the only one who likes BOTH the open sandbox AND linear stories? Years ago, I got tired of linear games. Then I played the open sandbox and loved them. Then I got tired of open sandbox style. So I played linear games. Now... I think they both have their strengths and are fun.

I think the tactics thing (no matter how imperfect it might be) is a step in the right direction as far as design principle. Companions should have a mind of their own. Teaching them a few tactics to follow is how you should control them.

My only complaint is that I wish the controls where more like Oblivion or any 3rd person 'FPS'-RPG. Actually better yet, controls like Mount & Blade or Dark Messiah. I don't like the point and click feel. I like to feel in control of my swings, as I trust my companions will do their best given the pre-battle orders I give them.

Next play through, I might try to see if I can try normal skill level with no potions, no pausing, and no party member control. That sounds fun.
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No you aren't the only one.

I love the open sandbox games for their exploration aspect but I find myself over time losing interest as the storyline nd thigns doesn't keep me that pulled in (I'm the same with GTA games, etc).

Whereas with the more linear games I miss the exploration aspect but I find the storyline keeps me drawn in more and generally tighter to playing the game.
 
How quickly the story unfolds is up to you. If you spend alot of time wandering around which is perfectly fine, the story will wait for you.
 
GAHHHHH!!! Just finished the game last night. One of the best games I have ever played. I have never been so engrossed in a main plot. Every bit of dialogue and response choice had my full attention. I have never felt so attached to the characters of a game before. Speaking with my companions at the very end just simply game me chills....Shale, Sten, Allistair, I will miss them. LOVE LOVE LOVED it! A true masterpiece.
 
Stiler said:
No you aren't the only one.

I love the open sandbox games for their exploration aspect but I find myself over time losing interest as the storyline nd thigns doesn't keep me that pulled in (I'm the same with GTA games, etc).

Whereas with the more linear games I miss the exploration aspect but I find the storyline keeps me drawn in more and generally tighter to playing the game.
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Thats me too, Lost interest in Oblivion, Fallout 3, GTA series, good games but I've not finished any one of them. I always eventually lose interest and move on to something thats more linear.
 
WabeWalker said:
The so-called 'tactics' are Bioware's attempt at creating a game in which you don't have to pause the game and queue up orders. And why did Bioware do this? Folks, this is a decision to please the console crowd, plain and simple. This decision was done to make it so that you could play the game in real time.
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Source? Just curious since I don't recall ever seeing BioWare openly say that.

WabeWalker said:
Unfortunately, it doesn't work. But more importantly, why do I care? Is this supposed to be rewarding - going into a menu and fussing and fiddling with a bunch of menu drop-downs? I don't find that to be engaging in any way whatsoever. I want to play an RPG, not spend half my time fussing about with a string of menu commands.
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It works just fine once you decide how you want that character to behave. It's pretty much a one time set it and forget it. Out of the 50-100 hours you will spend playing, you might spend 30 minutes setting tactics. There's no need to waste tons of time on the tactics screen. The longest to set was my rogue, with one profile for melee and one for ranged. It's almost like rolling up all your characters at the start of an old AD&D Gold Box game. (Boy that statement is gonna show my age around here).

WabeWalker said:
In my opinion, Bioware has tried to please two separate groups of people here, with mixed results. RPG of the decade? It's not even the RPG of the year for me.
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Different strokes for different folks, as it always is. Personally I wasn't overly taken in by Fallout 3. It was a glorified FPS with some RPG type elements tossed in. I much prefer a game like this, others want that instant satisfaction of just jumping into a firefight and seeing blood on the walls. Overall, the reviews indicate most people think DA is a winner, but you can't please everyone all the time.

WabeWalker said:
Ah well, but it's only a game. No need to spend too much time discussing this. :)
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No need to, but nice to see other people's opinions on things and rationally discuss them. I'm always glad to see an opinion other than my own, as it gives me something to think about, even if I disagree with it. Nothing wrong with it at all. In a way I feel bad you aren't getting the satisfaction out of it that I am, but you probably loved some games that I was bored with. It's just the way it is. ;)
 
Played it through a little over twice now, and do enjoy the game a fair deal, just way too much dealing with politics/important people's emotions, and not enough fantasy to make it a truly spectacular game for me. Hopefully next time we'll get to see some truly epic fantasy from Bioware :D
 
I'm really enjoying the game. As far as tactics are concerned, I spent the time to set them up right, and now I need to pause only 3 or 4 times during a big fight. If I'm just fighting thugs, I don't need to pause at all.

I think that the inclusion of tactics was a great way to add depth to the game. My party acts the way I want them to with little hands on micro managing as possible.
 
Personally, one of my favorite things was the drop down tactics menu.

If you want one of your party members to attack a certain enemy, theres a map for that! Really, you can set one of your people to attack mages, archers, elites, bosses, mobs with low hp etc. I had Sten using Sunder Armor on bosses to open the fight, Wynne would use Stone Fist on my current target, knocking them down and setting my rogue up for some free backstabs. Shale would go Pummeling Strikes plus Slam or Stone Heart depending on if there was a boss or if it was just a bunch of weaker mobs. Morrigan would crowd control on large groups automatically, or do straight dps if there were no large groups.

There are a ton of options, I really never needed to queue anything.
 
I am having an absolute blast with this game. First game in a while where I cared to learn about the characters rather than just bust through this game as fast as I can. Spent about half an hour before bed last night having my main character talk to the others. Never cared to do this in Mass Effect.
 
Tzzird said:
I am having an absolute blast with this game. First game in a while where I cared to learn about the characters rather than just bust through this game as fast as I can. Spent about half an hour before bed last night having my main character talk to the others. Never cared to do this in Mass Effect.
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Agreed, and I loved Mass Effect. This is a superb RPG.
 
Parmenides said:
You can set them to always attack your target... though sometimes you might want them to attack someone else.
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Exactly. MY tactics change. Usually I have them all assist on one enemy but it's not unusual to have them split among enemies. Soon as I de-select one, bam, back to whatever dumb AI.

Tonight i'm going to try to disable tactics and see if that will keep them attacking whatever I point them to attack, even w/o being selected. That's how it worked in BG (I Played with AI OFF)
LeninGHOLA said:
Personally, one of my favorite things was the drop down tactics menu.

If you want one of your party members to attack a certain enemy, theres a map for that! Really, you can set one of your people to attack mages, archers, elites, bosses, mobs with low hp etc. I had Sten using Sunder Armor on bosses to open the fight, Wynne would use Stone Fist on my current target, knocking them down and setting my rogue up for some free backstabs. Shale would go Pummeling Strikes plus Slam or Stone Heart depending on if there was a boss or if it was just a bunch of weaker mobs. Morrigan would crowd control on large groups automatically, or do straight dps if there were no large groups.

There are a ton of options, I really never needed to queue anything.
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That sounds all fun and stuff but some of us prefer to play the game rather than watch it.
 
bigdogchris said:
Exactly. MY tactics change. Usually I have them all assist on one enemy but it's not unusual to have them split among enemies. Soon as I de-select one, bam, back to whatever dumb AI.

Tonight i'm going to try to disable tactics and see if that will keep them attacking whatever I point them to attack, even w/o being selected. That's how it worked in BG (I Played with AI OFF)That sounds all fun and stuff but some of us prefer to play the game rather than watch it.
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You have multiple tactics profiles. Its super easy to set them to just attack your target and do nothing else.
 
*SPOILERS*

After you kill Arl Howe and try to walk out with Anora, you get ambushed by a room full of archers. In my diligence, I didn't surrender and managed to kill all of them. Did I miss out on anything by doing that? Am I the only one?
 
newster said:
*SPOILERS*

After you kill Arl Howe and try to walk out with Anora, you get ambushed by a room full of archers. In my diligence, I didn't surrender and managed to kill all of them. Did I miss out on anything by doing that? Am I the only one?
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I killed them all as well. My brother did not... I think all you do is become imprisoned then your buddies bust you out. You then do some mini mission to escape I suppose. I'm not sure what happens after that.
 
newster said:
*SPOILERS*

*SPOILERS**SPOILERS**SPOILERS**SPOILERS*
*SPOILERS**SPOILERS**SPOILERS*
you get ambushed by a room full of archers. In my diligence, I didn't surrender and managed to kill all of them. Did I miss out on anything by doing that? Am I the only one?
Click to expand...

*SPOILERS**SPOILERS**SPOILERS*
*SPOILERS**SPOILERS**SPOILERS*
Yes, you are captured and you are taken to prison. That part was one of my more notable sections. I was romancing Morrigan and she had given me a ring. I think that unlocks the abilty to have party members rescue you. I chose Morri and Sten to rescue us. Upon opening the jail cell, Sten had one of his most memorable lines in the game for me. It went something like: "Do not think that I cannot appreciate the irony in this situation." or something like that. Superb writing!
*SPOILERS**SPOILERS**SPOILERS**SPOILERS**SPOILERS*
*SPOILERS**SPOILERS**SPOILERS**SPOILERS**SPOILERS*
 
bigdogchris said:
Exactly. MY tactics change. Usually I have them all assist on one enemy but it's not unusual to have them split among enemies. Soon as I de-select one, bam, back to whatever dumb AI.
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Yeah, don't do the "attack selected leader's target" or however it's stated. That will give them attacking ADHD. Instead do it by name, like "attack Joe's target" or some such.

I've just been micro-ing it myself with lots of pausing. Kind of hard to preset attacks when my main character is a bloodmage/arcane warrior. I do a lot of random things, depending upon the battlefield. I might run in with the sword, or I might go with AOE. Next playthrough, I'm going to try to keep my hands off the micromanagement.


Did anyone find that the first half of the game, the average joe enemy has 3-4 times the hitpoints of your companions? (not even counting the bosses) I'm playing on normal skill.
 
I can agree with Wabe on the tactics system. I’m not a big fan of it.

Now I was a big BG/IWD aficionado and I love pausing and micro-managing my party, but going through the tactics menus for each of your characters in DA feels tedious and takes me out of the experience.

When it comes right down to it, the whole system seems fairly unnecessary (unless you want Dungeon Siege style combat). On the easy “auto-pilot” battles tactics aren’t needed since all you really have to do is set your character’s behavior. In the more complicated/difficult battles, the tactics can actually be extremely frustrating; specifically when you don’t want to focus fire the whole time.

It’s only a minor gripe though since I can basically choose to play the game without the system.

That said I do still use some tactics but only for healing, buffs, and auras. In this regard the system can be quite convenient.

In the end, DA is still one of the best games I’ve ever played. I’ve put in probably 50+ hours and been completely enthralled the whole time.
 
newster said:
*SPOILERS*

After you kill........ Did I miss out on anything by doing that? Am I the only one?
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Thats literally the hardest fight in the game. Playing on Nightmare, I just looked at all that as it went agro, laughed and said 'yeah right'. :rolleyes:

*I had the option to get rescued but decided to get out alone. My character wouldnt have waited. The escape sequence is pretty cool.*
 
Ritorix said:
Thats literally the hardest fight in the game. Playing on Nightmare, I just looked at all that as it went agro, laughed and said 'yeah right'. :rolleyes:

*I had the option to get rescued but decided to get out alone. My character wouldnt have waited. The escape sequence is pretty cool.*
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Yup, that fight is absolute murder to win without some work. :D

I'm almost there again on my second playthrough, and I may intentionally lose it this time just to play the breakout part. The firsst time through I won it, but damn it took some doing to keep from getting shot to ribbons. ;)
 
I ran out of that room into the hallway where I came from, then you can keep all the enemies in that room (except perhaps the sergeant lady). Glyph of repulsion works well if you leave it by the door. Then just plaster the room with AOE spells. I only had to fight the girl toe to toe (who hits hard). Everyone else was simmering in the blaze in the other room. Probably only drank about 4 potions in total.

My hardest fight where those dogs at that one room at Redcliffe. lol
(I was low level at that point)
 
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I want to get my hands on the 360 version, because I've read that it's actually easier to play than the PC version.

With no way to pause the game at the end of every round, or to queue up orders, it's obvious that Bioware really wants us to play this game in real time - hence the so-called 'tactics' menu.

That fucking tactics menu has actually destroyed this game.

It's obvious that Bioware said to themselves: "Look, console gamers aren't going to be very happy about pausing the game every thirty seconds, so we need to come up with a way to get around that?" And apparently their solution was to create the 'tactics' menu, which of course scripts the A.I. of your party members, allowing for real time play.

On the console version, which appears to be easier, yes, maybe that does work. On the PC version it doesn't. I've been trying to figure out why this game isn't working for me, and I think that this might be why.

It's almost like the developer was conflicted: they wanted Dragon Age to be a game that would represent Bioware's 'return to its pc roots' - and yet at the same time they were trying desperately to please the console crowd?

Ah well, it's just a game. No need to get too upset about this fucking thing, which has turned out to be the biggest disappointment of the year for me personally.
 
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