Dragon Age Origins discussion...

HDtextures_big_creatures_drga_and_ogra - http://www.megaupload.com/?d=ZB8N5V5W
HDtextures_creatures_succubus - http://www.megaupload.com/?d=RZDVSANU
HDtextures_final_part1 - http://www.megaupload.com/?d=MIKHTH1U
HDtextures_final_part2 - http://www.megaupload.com/?d=1KEQMJYM
HDtextures_weapons_and_shields - http://www.megaupload.com/?d=7L8IXEX5

Names of files I'm putting on MegaUpload. Might turn out to be named that and you can search for them...don't know.

README: step one: extract files

step two: Install to X:\Dragon Age\packages\core

step three: enjoy
_____________________________________________________________________
UNINSTALLATION:
Go to: X:\Dragon Age\packages\core - and delete OVERRIDE folder.
 
Last edited:
What I meant was that the game is clearly designed, at least partially, with the console crowd in mind. That's what the 'tactics' are all about. As I've repeatedly said, the tactics are just Bioware's way of allowing for console gamers to play in real time without having to pause the game.
See, I think you're wrong for a few reasons. All of the original Infinity engine games (BG/IDW/PST) had built in AI that you could choose how they would play, and they were PC only. NWN 2 had a party AI system and that was PC only. After a decade of AI work, I'm kinda surprised that we only have a 'tactics system'. It's just a more fleshed out version of something that existed in 1998.
In the PC version there should have been a pause-at-the-end-of-every-round feature, or at least an orders queue. Clearly, Bioware would prefer that we play this game without pausing. Okay, might as well play the console version then.
Have you ever played BG with auto-pause on? Obviously not. It's fucking annoying for 1 reason. This reason is, even though the game is capable of having that tactical ability, you don't always need it. There have been dozens of encounters in DA where I don't have to pause, I just have my characters do some beat downs and heal them up. Pausing is not always necessary.
 
Ohhhh, you're bagging on the little one liners that your character says when you click on something? "Yes" "Going" "On my way" ?? Alrighty then...

It's mostly the combat quips, but also that. If you think it's trivial, good for you, but if I were to spend hundreds of man-hours making a highly customizable character creation to go with an open-ended game, I wouldn't skimp out on it. I could basically ignore it and treat my character like a block of wood (ie. faceless, soundless entity) too, but that defeats the purpose of playing a western-style RPG where you play a role that you choose.

Apparently I'm not the only one who feels that the main player character voice overs are lame as well:
Mine always says..

Can I get you a ladder? So you can GET OFF MY BACK!?

It really gets annoying.

I forgot which voice I chose, but I *hate* it when the guy says "FOOLISH!"


I'd rather have had them not spend a single cent or any time doing those voices and have a completely mute character and instead had them put more random dialog from the party members.
 
Yeah I'd love to watch the console users attempt to play real time in hectic fights with that stupid ring menu, that would amuse me greatly. With their awkward accelerated analogue sticks that makes them always overshoot when trying to place anything of any accuracy like a directional cone spell, HAHAHA, they'd end up freezing 1/2 their team mates to the spot.

You can pop them on the fly with the mouse/keyboard and mapping the spells to numeric keys and use WASD for movement, can easily run in Morrigan to the right angle to freeze almost all the enemies without needing to pause.
 
I'm curious about how everybody handled Redcliffe castle mission.

*Spoiler* warning



Should I have killed Conner? Sten & Morrigan both approved, but I'm wondering if the quest inside the fade is fun & worth going back to a previous save.

What do you think?
 
I'm curious about how everybody handled Redcliffe castle mission.

*Spoiler* warning



Should I have killed Conner? Sten & Morrigan both approved, but I'm wondering if the quest inside the fade is fun & worth going back to a previous save.

What do you think?

You should have probably:



If you go to the mages tower you get sent into the fade and there are a TON of permanent +stats in it (I gained like +3str, +3willpower, +2 cunning, +2 magic, etc). It can get a bit annoying though. It's a lot of backtracking (it's like a giant maze) but it's worth it for the stats and the storyline is neat in the fade.

Once you do that you'll get a good approval from Allister and such. Though if you have Sten I doubt you're using Allister (though he's the better tank imo, and he's funny as hell).
 
I'm curious about how everybody handled Redcliffe castle mission.

*Spoiler* warning



Should I have killed Conner? Sten & Morrigan both approved, but I'm wondering if the quest inside the fade is fun & worth going back to a previous save.

What do you think?

If they approve, you are probably doing something bad. ;)
 
Yeah I'd love to watch the console users attempt to play real time in hectic fights with that stupid ring menu, that would amuse me greatly. With their awkward accelerated analogue sticks that makes them always overshoot when trying to place anything of any accuracy like a directional cone spell, HAHAHA, they'd end up freezing 1/2 their team mates to the spot.

You can pop them on the fly with the mouse/keyboard and mapping the spells to numeric keys and use WASD for movement, can easily run in Morrigan to the right angle to freeze almost all the enemies without needing to pause.

I sometimes freeze my own teammates for kicks and giggle, great fun :D
 
There any nice build compendium? Started playing the game last night; Elven Mage. There are so many different skills though so I am sort of "woah"
 
There any nice build compendium? Started playing the game last night; Elven Mage. There are so many different skills though so I am sort of "woah"

Not seen any. What I'm doing is gonna finish first playthrough. Then on a second run through I will know better how to "spec" out my toons.
 
There any nice build compendium? Started playing the game last night; Elven Mage. There are so many different skills though so I am sort of "woah"

Once you get Wynne in your party you'll have a good healer. I'd advise getting her as soon as you can by doing the Circle of Mages part first after Lothering.

There are tons of ways to mix and match spells to great effect, and it will take some time to find a mix you enjoy using.

Might want to make an account on the official DA forums and read through there. A lot of people were posting builds and tactics designs at one point. Worst case, download the addon someone made to reset your points so you can make a build, test it, then reset it and try again.
 
I'm curious about how everybody handled Redcliffe castle mission.

*Spoiler* warning



Should I have killed Conner? Sten & Morrigan both approved, but I'm wondering if the quest inside the fade is fun & worth going back to a previous save.

What do you think?

*Spoiler*

For the most part, it doesn't matter too much that you killed Conner. You still get the help of the Arl and the main quest continues. There are 2 sections of the Fade in this part of the game. Stiler is talking about the Circle Tower. This is the Redcliff Fade. Here, pretty much the only thing you get is to fight a few mobs and then a Desire Demon offers a bribe if you let her continue to infect Conner. You get the choice of killing the demon anyway or taking the bribe.

The bribe can be useful. One of the bribes is to unlock Blood Mage, which is a useful specialization. I gave that to Wynne at level 14. :)

The other bribes are more mundane, like giving you a tome that when used gives your character an extra talent to put at level up. Note that taking the bribe doesn't have any apparent adverse consequences (other than guilt) since no one from the outside world knows about the bribe and Conner looks healthy again.
 
Ah. Okay. I think I may revert to a previous save then and take the bribe. I think I need to go back far enough so I can choose a spell for Morrigan other than heal. I really needed a healer and didn't get Wynne yet. Argh. Why does the workday have to last so long?!
 
For that section, you might have the option of other mages besides Morrigan depending on your past choices, but there's a link earlier in this thread to a mod that you can install that will let you respec your characters whenever you're in camp. It might be easier just to respec Morrigan slightly to give her some healing rather than re-play large portions of the game.
 
HDtextures_big_creatures_drga_and_ogra - http://www.megaupload.com/?d=ZB8N5V5W
HDtextures_creatures_succubus - http://www.megaupload.com/?d=RZDVSANU
HDtextures_final_part1 - http://www.megaupload.com/?d=MIKHTH1U
HDtextures_final_part2 - http://www.megaupload.com/?d=1KEQMJYM
HDtextures_weapons_and_shields - http://www.megaupload.com/?d=7L8IXEX5

Names of files I'm putting on MegaUpload. Might turn out to be named that and you can search for them...don't know.

README: step one: extract files

step two: Install to X:\Dragon Age\packages\core

step three: enjoy
_____________________________________________________________________
UNINSTALLATION:
Go to: X:\Dragon Age\packages\core - and delete OVERRIDE folder.

There you go.
 
Ah. Okay. I think I may revert to a previous save then and take the bribe. I think I need to go back far enough so I can choose a spell for Morrigan other than heal. I really needed a healer and didn't get Wynne yet. Argh. Why does the workday have to last so long?!

Regarding the mages, I'm playing through with just Morrigan as the mage in my party and I skilled her up once for a heal and it is working out ok.

As long as y ou have some good crowd control spells (IE cone of ice) and can use the force field you can get through most battles just fine with only one heal on a mage and some health pots to fall back on.

However if youre main character is a mage then yeah, you can take the place of morrigan or Wynne depending on how you want to build your spelllist.
 
I'm a warrior dwarf dual-wielding. I still use Alistair & Sten with Morrigan. I like the damage Sten does with the 2-hand sword, and I like Alistair for absorbing damage. I do decent damage as well. I didn't think that the level 7 Rogue chick (forgot her name) would be as good as Sten.

We drink a lot of potions because of the cooldown time for heal. It has helped a lot with Morrigan & one heal point.

Is there anyplace to purchase many Elfroots ? I like the unlimited flasks & distilling potions in camp, but need a supply of Elfroot now.

Does anybody use the dog? Is he any good?
 
Honestly I think I am becoming too old and stubborn to play classic RPG. When I was younger I would spend time thinking about all the stats and spells and whatnot. But now all I want is the spells and leveling up already done for me. I want the game to play itself I guess, or maybe I'm just not enjoying it that much. I just find the game too puzzlish and strategic for planning character development and tactics.

I had an easier time deciphering Mass Effect, less playable characters and more emphasis on each class )the huge guy is strong, the frail lady has psychic skills etc..) DA is like "ok here are some pretty looking people, pick some spells for them and hope it works out through trial and error, oh and we don't allow respec without a mod, bye!"

Although I enjoyed Mass Effect alot more than DA, maybe it is the low level of interest...
 
Mass effect (while quite good) is a hugely dumed down "RPG", it has to be with the console users as a primary source of sales.

However I think dragon age would have benefited from party members which only need minimal guidance for leveling up, being able to take control over any of them at any time and the need to fine tune each one and fight with them pretty much hinders re-playability. I want to go through as a warrior next but I have already pretty much done all the warrior stuff because you have one in your party.

A certain amount of AI guided leveling would have been better IMO, it would have made the first run through a bit less demanding in terms of micromanagement and given you something to look forward to when playing as another character.

Anyway the game is awesome either way, the classes can be so varied, the spell list and the way its orderd for the mage archtype is brilliant, so many to chose from, you could completely re-spec again and not pick the same spell twice, thats more or less the same for every archtype.
 
Honestly I think I am becoming too old and stubborn to play classic RPG. When I was younger I would spend time thinking about all the stats and spells and whatnot. But now all I want is the spells and leveling up already done for me. I want the game to play itself I guess, or maybe I'm just not enjoying it that much. I just find the game too puzzlish and strategic for planning character development and tactics.

I had an easier time deciphering Mass Effect, less playable characters and more emphasis on each class )the huge guy is strong, the frail lady has psychic skills etc..) DA is like "ok here are some pretty looking people, pick some spells for them and hope it works out through trial and error, oh and we don't allow respec without a mod, bye!"

Although I enjoyed Mass Effect alot more than DA, maybe it is the low level of interest...

Shockingly, I'm with you on this.

Mass Effect wasn't a first-person shooter, and therefore didn't require you to have twitch based skills in order to succeed at it - it was very much a role playing game - and yet it just felt very... immediate. It had the same here and now feel that you get from a first person shooter.

The only thing that Dragon Age has done for me is make me want to play Mass Effect 2. Yeah, sure, I was looking forward to playing ME2 this January - but suddenly it's THE game that I want.

My RPG of the year, by the way, goes to the superb Risen, which I loved. Number two goes to Drakensang, which I spent the entire summer playing. Dragon Age is a distant third, wallowing in the mire like some fat cow that wandered into a bog and got stuck... stupid cow.
 
I'm honestly not enjoying the combat that much, but the story is so immersing that I will keep playing.
 
I'm starting to see a pattern here. Dragon Age. Bit of a disappointment, yeah? Not the great game we were expecting. Tolerating it rather than loving it. Wow.
 
I'm starting to see a pattern here. Dragon Age. Bit of a disappointment, yeah? Not the great game we were expecting. Tolerating it rather than loving it. Wow.

You sound bitter.

I'm playing DA:O slowly and taking it all in.
Fantastic game.
It seems you want it all immediately and have a tantrum when you dont get it.
Can you put your girly online to see if she agrees :)
 
Yea I'm with you on the RPG of the year awards too LOL.

Risen was alot of fun, no handholding or dumbed down, the challenge was still there and played like an action-RPG. I would enjoy the combat, but really the breadth of the game cannot hold a candle to Gothic 2 or 3 for example.

Dragon Age is a good game but just isn't my cup of tea.
 
You sound bitter.

I'm playing DA:O slowly and taking it all in.
Fantastic game.
It seems you want it all immediately and have a tantrum when you dont get it.
Can you put your girly online to see if she agrees :)

This is a forum, right. We are here to exchange ideas, are we not? What's up with the personal attack, then? Telling me to put my little girly online has nothing to do with Dragon Age.

Did I attack anybody here?

No, I did not. I attacked the game.

Ah well, I should expect that sort of low behavior by now. This is a gaming forum after all. We can't really expect the cream of the crop to be coming in here. Go ahead then, call me names.... give me liberty, or give me death... I'm free... I'm free...
 
I'm starting to see a pattern here. Dragon Age. Bit of a disappointment, yeah? Not the great game we were expecting. Tolerating it rather than loving it. Wow.

I don't see the pattern at all. This game is far better than Mass Effect. Mass Effect was decent, but some parts of Mass Effect (exploring essentially the same island to find a few bits of trash loot) were boring as hell. I only did it all because I'm a completionist and it bugs the hell out of me when I am missing something. The combat system in ME isn't as good, nor did it give me as much of a challenge (which I appreciate) as Dragon Age either.

As to the people criticizing you, I think it's because you've pretty much said the same thing in this thread across multiple posts, and even after having said it, you keep on reiterating disappointment. We get it. You're disappointed because you wanted a game that Bioware never had in mind to make. I sincerely hope that no one important (ie. with influence on game development) listens to your ramblings, since that would make for a disappointing game for me. I'm not even that old, but I can appreciate tabletop DND style games and gameplay.
 
This is a forum, right. We are here to exchange ideas, are we not? What's up with the personal attack, then? Telling me to put my little girly online has nothing to do with Dragon Age.

Did I attack anybody here?

No, I did not. I attacked the game.

Ah well, I should expect that sort of low behavior by now. This is a gaming forum after all. We can't really expect the cream of the crop to be coming in here. Go ahead then, call me names.... give me liberty, or give me death... I'm free... I'm free...

No but your drama whoring is getting old. A couple people agree with you does not equate to a pattern out of a thread this long.
 
No but your drama whoring is getting old. A couple people agree with you does not equate to a pattern out of a thread this long.

Personal attacks aren't necessary, no matter what you might think of a person. You should attack a person's ideas at a forum, not the person himself.

(And by the way, when I wrote... I'm starting to see a pattern here... that was meant to be a joke. I was kidding. The vast majority of people here love the game. Two people said that they found certain problems with the game, so I wrote, I'm starting to see a pattern here. That was supposed to be humorous. Okay, you didn't see that. But again, no need to start insulting people.)
 
I am personally enjoying Dragon Age more so than I did Fallout 3 and Mass Effect which I wasn't expecting at all. Just the superb story, voice acting, humor, tactics but most of all challenge of the game(playing on nightmare) has me glued to the game.

All I can say is good job Bioware and hope they can bring this same experience along with better combat from what ME had over to ME2 and I'll be in RPG heaven.
 
I can't stop playing this damn game! It's a true masterpiece... no other rpgs can touch this right now.
 
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