[Raymond Luxury Yacht]

Gothos, on 23 November 2009 - 04:47 PM, said:

maybe you sided with the templars? aka decided to wipe out the circle?
you can check that easily by checking if Wynne and Irwing are still alive

I did and and didn't like the results, which is why I reloaded. When I did so, I realized that I shouldn't have even gotten to that scene yet, as I was significantly too early in the level for it to happen. Some glitch triggered it early.

Another glitch in the circle quest was that I went back to the room where the final boss was after beating him. He was alive again! Odd, but no big deal.

[Tarcanus]

So, tell me something about this game, everyone:

I tend to not have a crazy amount of time to sit down and play games in the evening, maybe an hour - hour and a half. Does DA:O allow for quick saving? Or is it save points? Do the quests tend to be long and drawn out? Or do-able within my time-frame?

I'm also curious about if the questing gets repetitive at all. Are the environments varied? How linear is the world? I know that you can do thing in various orders and that will affect the outcome of the game, but when it comes to just randomly exploring the overworld(or however it works in DA:O)- how much of that is possible?

I would read reviews, but the things I want to know about are only covered vaguely or not at all, unless it stands out as either terrible or amazing. I'm curious about the opinions of people whose taste in games and books I've come to trust more than usual.

[Jusentantaka]

uhm... PC version lets you save anywhere but in combat. I imagine that the 360 version is the same, since it was in Mass Effect.

Quests are all unique (to the game anyway) A few of the main quests are long (Orzamaar, Redcliff), and not doable in an hour or so, some of the side quests take a good long time to complete, but most are pretty short, but there's a journal, quest markers and easy saves, so you're not gonna get lost on what you were doing, and theres only a couple parts in the entire game where you'll be stuck unable to save because of combat for more than five or ten minutes, and it isnt much longer even then.

There are some dumb and repetitive 'find me x # of this and I'll pay you' minor quests, but they arent important, and the rewards (money only) means they really aren't worth running down unless you want to. But even there there is a decent amount of variety, from wandering around to activate places of power for mages to making traps for stupid farmers to Dumping bodies in the well of a church, ect ect.

You can go wander from place to place on the world map, except in a few long dungeons you aren't at all forced to stick around and complete the area's main quest before going somewhere else. (and even in big dungeons, you could probably leave, if you want to backtrack your steps twice over)

There's a lot of caves and dungeons and the like and that might be repetitive, but it is a fantasy RPG, with dragons and dawn of war-esque synch kills.

This post has been edited by Jusentantaka: 23 November 2009 - 09:32 PM

[lord of tragedy]

Gothos, on 23 November 2009 - 03:19 PM, said:

of all it's parts, how could the beginning be shite for you? fuck me, you've got some strange taste, sir...

i was a dalish elf. the look of the game was pretty poor and there was a distinct lack of freedom. reminded me of a lord of the rings game. then the squad combat kicked in and i realised that it was all about micromanagement and quite cerebral. so i forgive the graphics. and the episodic structure. i'm only in the forest looking for winterfang.

[Tarcanus]

Jusentantaka, on 23 November 2009 - 09:30 PM, said:

uhm... PC version lets you save anywhere but in combat. I imagine that the 360 version is the same, since it was in Mass Effect.

Quests are all unique (to the game anyway) A few of the main quests are long (Orzamaar, Redcliff), and not doable in an hour or so, some of the side quests take a good long time to complete, but most are pretty short, but there's a journal, quest markers and easy saves, so you're not gonna get lost on what you were doing, and theres only a couple parts in the entire game where you'll be stuck unable to save because of combat for more than five or ten minutes, and it isnt much longer even then.

There are some dumb and repetitive 'find me x # of this and I'll pay you' minor quests, but they arent important, and the rewards (money only) means they really aren't worth running down unless you want to. But even there there is a decent amount of variety, from wandering around to activate places of power for mages to making traps for stupid farmers to Dumping bodies in the well of a church, ect ect.

You can go wander from place to place on the world map, except in a few long dungeons you aren't at all forced to stick around and complete the area's main quest before going somewhere else. (and even in big dungeons, you could probably leave, if you want to backtrack your steps twice over)

There's a lot of caves and dungeons and the like and that might be repetitive, but it is a fantasy RPG, with dragons and dawn of war-esque synch kills.

Awesome, thank you! My only worry is your line about there being a lot of caves and dungeons that might get repetitive. Do all the caves and dungeons look similar? (as in how Oblivion had only forts, ruins, caves, etc. and each cave looked like every other cave except for layout)

[Jusentantaka]

Tarcanus, on 23 November 2009 - 09:56 PM, said:

Awesome, thank you! My only worry is your line about there being a lot of caves and dungeons that might get repetitive. Do all the caves and dungeons look similar? (as in how Oblivion had only forts, ruins, caves, etc. and each cave looked like every other cave except for layout)

Nah, its not like oblivion thankfully. Its far more Baldurs gate or Neverwinter nights than elder scrolls. But without dice.

Still, dwarven ruins all look ... y'know... dwarfy. Only feels repetitive because there's a few big areas right after one another. The dwarf main quest part is probably the longest/largest of the game and it takes place entirely underground and it kind of blurs a little in the middle. But I thought that part was still the strongest chapter of the five main parts. But most importantly: it's not obliviony with cave-sell-cave-sell-yawn-sell-cave... repetition.

and best of all, Amazon has dropped 10$ (PC)/15$ (console) off the list price for a pre-thanksgiving sale. Its almost like you can get the DLC for free. Except you have to pay for it.

[Gothos]

lord of tragedy, I must admit that the dalish origin was a bit worse than the human noble and magi I've done, but... I really wouldn't judge the game by it's graphics. ever. like, EVER. it's secondary completely to gameplay, story, characters and dialogue. so "forgiving" graphics is a bit like an alien sentiment to me...


Tarcanus, there's several types of underground enviroments underground: some are ancient Tevinter ruins, some are just caves, there's some ancient dwarven underground roads, and there's the cellars in human buildings... I wouldn't ever expect every little place to be different, but the various dungeons are distinguishable from each other I'd say... as there aren't as many little ones like in Oblivion, but rather fewer much bigger ones, I wouldn't say you'd see it as repetitive. personally I probably miss much of the detail they put in the enviroments since I look at them from the pragmatic side - just a place for me to fight stuff and push the story forward - but I wouldn't say it reaches Oblivion's level of "oh god haven't I done this a dozen times already?". not at all. frankly you'll be spending a lot of time in open terrain, and inside buildings, street alleys... if I was to compare it to anything it'd be Baldur's Gate II - only with more variety allowed by new technology.


as a side note, after Shale I want no other tank in this game. ever. he bloody rocks! playing with the PC as a rogue is pretty amusing - it can get really dangerous rather fast in combat - takes a lot more micromanagement to be effective than mage or warrior did, but the possibilities are there to make it a damage dealing powerhouse... as long as stuff keeps looking elsewhere.

[lord of tragedy]

gothos i grew up with a zx spectrum. gameplay is king for me. but if it looks as good as say fallout, it helps me to immerse myself in the story. it just took me a while to plck up the subtleties and look beyond the tolkien light. i'd never played diablo, i was a ff7 man so dungeon crawlers are new to me. unless you count bards tale.

[Aleksandrov]

Shale and Arcane Warrior are the two most broken (read: ownage) pieces of the game.

If you don't have Shale, Alastair is also a beast to tank with. When I didn't have Wynne I used the dog as well.

I refuse to use Sten.

Probably going to go for Shale on this char after doing a bit of Denerim.

Spoiler

I'm playing on Nightmare at the moment, aside from the first boss fight (stupid ogre). I'm relatively cruising through the game. Just need one tip on taking down Flemeth in dragon form. Any advice? Stupid whore-witch Morrigan didn't tell me her mother turns into a freaking dragon so I wasn't prepared for it. Should I set the field around the place with mountains of traps before I start or what? After tanking her for about 30 minutes I bring her health down to only 7/10...

And I didn't know how the option to "man-the-F***" up with Alastair until way latter that his quest for Goldanna was that... Now I'm pretty much forced to select Cailan's traitor-daughter to the throne without Alastair marrying her and going whiny.

If you liked Baldur's Gate, this should be more of your type rather than free-roaming like Oblivion/Fallout 3s.

[Jusentantaka]

Yeah, this game sure isnt hard. I played that fight on nightmare with a warrior (level 18), hard with a mage (where it was cake):

Spoiler

With my warrior I was using the unique 2H sword you get from the throne room in Orzamaar (step on the three tiles, fight a man-dragon - easy, but you can't do it if you've completed the orzamaar main quest.) Had the full 2H tree, and most of the basic warrior skills. Knockdowns and stuns are useless against her, but the skills which keep you from being knocked down are absolutely necessary for a tank. Had Zefram, Whine and Leilani (yeah, I know) I taught flowergirl assassin as well, (since I usually brought Morrigan along rather than Z) anyway, Whine I set up to revive, rejuvenate, ect - never had her set up to cast a damage spell and just had her set up to heal left and right, plus a health<50% = big bad health pack condition for everyone just in case. My warrior kept Flem's attention with the warrior skills, (mostly anyway) while Z and Lei alternated their assassin skills and were chewing through health with their dual weap talents from behind. Took a bit of time, and I knew what I was getting into from doing it before, but Flem went down without much of a problem. A good deal of pausing, and switching members but it wasn't much of a problem.

I have yet to use traps except for a kinda 'oh, I looted one, lets put it down and see', and haven't really played a rogue type either, but I'd be interested to know if that works well on her. Might also be worth using poisons and (if you can) the elemental weapon damage spells.

And definitely loser-character is the Sten. And there were people on the BioWare site wanting a DLC about him. ugh.

This post has been edited by Jusentantaka: 24 November 2009 - 01:06 AM

[Silencer]

Just goes to show how me and Jusen can completely disagree on one game and have identical opinions on another. XD

As for traps...I think they only work if you have a plan. I mean, you can't really do much in terms of dropping them in-combat, it's kinda lame, so you have to drop them before hand in preparation. In which case you gotta lead your targets back to them. And they really don't do that much to the course of a fight, until you've got way better plans and materials to work with.

But yeah, Shale = win, Sten...well, he is just so bloody crap, and basically doesn't pipe up in any dialogues, unlike the other characters. I mean, it's kinda worth it to have both Morrigan and Alistair in your party the entire way through just for their interactions. XD

[Jusentantaka]

if you have stealth 4 you can drop traps whenever you want, actually.

morrigan and shale have quite a few gems too. Talking about shapeshifting, sex, golems, birds, sex... Maybe its just Shale's voice.

This post has been edited by Jusentantaka: 24 November 2009 - 04:53 AM

[Stalker]

ok, so got home today and it was here. Played up til through the Ostagar bit finished and am loving it so far.

Not sure how much I'll actually get into the tactics part at this point, as I don't want to spend time micromanaging the abilities but I expect to do that later
when I know what ability does what and when it is useful.

My only problem at this point is opening locked chests, which should be easy, but I can't figure it out.
What skill/talent governs that? My guess would have been either traps/stealing but I don't want to waste my points yet.
I figured that if I couldn't get it today that a party member later would be able to, or someone here could help heh.

@tarcanus- on 360, you can save at any point except when in combat. Does lend well to have 30 to 60 minutes free, though the game does suck you in heh.

This post has been edited by Stalker: 24 November 2009 - 05:55 AM

[Aleksandrov]

Rogue is surprisingly fun to play/roleplay. It gets a bit harder in some parts since even with Threaten and Taunt on for Alastair, bastards will still insist on hitting Vhailor.

Shale/Morri/Alastair is the funniest trio to have in your party in terms of dialogue.
Also the best combo if your main is a rogue.

What's the rate for which Dogmeat brings you free goodies? Is it to do with levelling? Dogmeat bought me like a Tier 4 Wood when I first got Morri. So that was a surprisingly good choice.

I might take on Flemeth after I get Shale... been slouching around doing minor quests for miserly amounts of gold at the moment. Rogue attacking Flemeth isn't a good idea, so I think I might have to do the traps route.

(Buying 99 Elvenroots/Distilling Agents/Flasks; damn you why won't you respawn in the inventory for the merchants!)

EDIT@STALKER: Yeah it's the lockpicking/traps thing for rogues that determines what's in chests. It should be automatic if you have Leliana (Frenchygirl) in your party. If not you have to either teach Zev or be a rogue yourself.

This post has been edited by Aleksandrov: 24 November 2009 - 06:00 AM

[Jusentantaka]

Aleksandrov, on 24 November 2009 - 05:58 AM, said:

What's the rate for which Dogmeat brings you free goodies? Is it to do with levelling? Dogmeat bought me like a Tier 4 Wood when I first got Morri. So that was a surprisingly good choice.

the dog has a sort of random list of items he can find, which is partly dependent on where he searches, part dependent on level, part random. Bioware has been somewhat unclears...

[Stalker]

alright thanks.
I'll just have to teach myself or wait til I find a rogue.

My party right now is me (human noble warrior), Morrigan, Alastair, and TRex (the warhound- best name ever).

[Aleksandrov]

Jusentantaka, on 24 November 2009 - 06:03 AM, said:

Aleksandrov, on 24 November 2009 - 05:58 AM, said:

What's the rate for which Dogmeat brings you free goodies? Is it to do with levelling? Dogmeat bought me like a Tier 4 Wood when I first got Morri. So that was a surprisingly good choice.

the dog has a sort of random list of items he can find, which is partly dependent on where he searches, part dependent on level, part random. Bioware has been somewhat unclears...

Alright fired up the Prima Official Guide. It says it's dependent mainly on the area that Dogmeat has been to. Pretty vague there too...

Stalker, on 24 November 2009 - 06:15 AM, said:

alright thanks.
I'll just have to teach myself or wait til I find a rogue.

My party right now is me (human noble warrior), Morrigan, Alastair, and TRex (the warhound- best name ever).

Yeah part of me playing as a rogue was all those locked chests tempting me...
Then I found out they don't contain ultra-sekrit tools. But picking them gives good XP.

[Traveller]

Gothos, on 23 November 2009 - 11:28 PM, said:

lord of tragedy, I must admit that the dalish origin was a bit worse than the human noble and magi I've done, but... I really wouldn't judge the game by it's graphics. ever. like, EVER. it's secondary completely to gameplay, story, characters and dialogue. so "forgiving" graphics is a bit like an alien sentiment to me...


Tarcanus, there's several types of underground enviroments underground: some are ancient Tevinter ruins, some are just caves, there's some ancient dwarven underground roads, and there's the cellars in human buildings... I wouldn't ever expect every little place to be different, but the various dungeons are distinguishable from each other I'd say... as there aren't as many little ones like in Oblivion, but rather fewer much bigger ones, I wouldn't say you'd see it as repetitive. personally I probably miss much of the detail they put in the enviroments since I look at them from the pragmatic side - just a place for me to fight stuff and push the story forward - but I wouldn't say it reaches Oblivion's level of "oh god haven't I done this a dozen times already?". not at all. frankly you'll be spending a lot of time in open terrain, and inside buildings, street alleys... if I was to compare it to anything it'd be Baldur's Gate II - only with more variety allowed by new technology.


as a side note, after Shale I want no other tank in this game. ever. he bloody rocks! playing with the PC as a rogue is pretty amusing - it can get really dangerous rather fast in combat - takes a lot more micromanagement to be effective than mage or warrior did, but the possibilities are there to make it a damage dealing powerhouse... as long as stuff keeps looking elsewhere.

I understand what you mean about gameplay coming first, but really, with the capabilities the game creators have at their disposal, poor graphics in games that have a good depth of gameplay annoy me - as why should good graphics be reserved for shallow games with poor gameplay?

I've always gone for the more interesting, immersive games, but a lot of the time they do have poorer graphics than more popular but shit games. It's like there's a rule that if you have good gameplay, you can scrimp on the graphics. I think all the best RPG's I've played have
kept me hooked, even though they never looked like much - but why shouldn't they look better? The combination of great gameplay plus fantastic visuals shouldn't be such a rare occurance. I mean, Assassins Creed looked incredible, but there was nothing to do.

Anyhoo - I'm waiting for Christmas for a new game; just looking through this thread has made my mind up which it's going to be...

[Gothos]

that's because developers spend too much of their time designing sweet enviroments and making a kickass engine and they don't spend that time on making the game good. also, if they don't go overboard with graphics, a lot more people will actually play the game decently - people with older systems, like myself, for instance. besides, I don't see the problem with dragon age - the graphics are very good imo, you know what stuff is at first sight, there's no confusion, everything's clear and believable.

also, why the Sten hate? he's absolutely awesome also part of my dream team I'd pick - Zevran, Sten and Shale... if the game was playable without a mage in your team that is

[Jusentantaka]

Traveller, on 24 November 2009 - 10:48 AM, said:

I understand what you mean about gameplay coming first, but really, with the capabilities the game creators have at their disposal, poor graphics in games that have a good depth of gameplay annoy me - as why should good graphics be reserved for shallow games with poor gameplay?

I've always gone for the more interesting, immersive games, but a lot of the time they do have poorer graphics than more popular but shit games. It's like there's a rule that if you have good gameplay, you can scrimp on the graphics. I think all the best RPG's I've played have
kept me hooked, even though they never looked like much - but why shouldn't they look better? The combination of great gameplay plus fantastic visuals shouldn't be such a rare occurance. I mean, Assassins Creed looked incredible, but there was nothing to do.

Anyhoo - I'm waiting for Christmas for a new game; just looking through this thread has made my mind up which it's going to be...

It's all about the money. Good graphics are really. really. expensive. (well, sort of) Because then they have to make a choice between allowing more people to play the game (i.e. including lower end graphics for older PCs) or just the high end graphics, which means they might have to include two or three times the texture/model data, and therefore spend two times as long/as much having artists make high res textures and models. Plus, this is an RPG. RPG gamers are not predominantly people who have bitchin top of the line rigs. Likely even fewer than in the past, with the economy sucking for going-on-two-years now.

And if you are the developers, you know the game isn't going to come close to the sales of Call of Duty/what the fuck ever with a huge budget, so you cannot spend the same amount of money on highest end graphics and then end up losing money.

I wouldn't really mind a nice game they throw down on graphics to the max though... cause if they did, the 360 would be revealed as the half inbred uncle you pretend isn't related to your PC family when it chokes, overheats and dies trying to render scenes a PC could sleep through.


And sten sucks because he is boring. Alistair is wierd and virginal and funny. Morrigan is evil, sadistic and funny. Oghren is drunk and drunk and funny. Leilani is a sweet little lispy lipstick lesbian. Zefram is some sort of knife wielding guido. Shale's awesome.

Sten makes me think of Bob Dole.