Dragon Age 3: Inquisition announced

[cmdrdredd]

Out of curiosity, who did everyone recruit? The Mages or Templars?

I recruited the Mages, but it seems to have ticked off everyone but Solas and Blackwall. :/

Mages and if you do templars you get opposite approvals. Either way someone will not be happy. The mage quest to me was better. I looked up the other one to see the difference.

 

[zinfamous]

There are some options when you start crafting higher tier armor that give bonus for healing on kill and life steal. Knight Enchanter gets a focus ability that full heals the party even dead members and gives regen for 10seconds. At tier 3 it heals 25% every second. Necromancer has a passive that heals 10% health and mana on enemy death. Artificer gets an ability called fallback plan that allows you to place a lantern and when you are about to die you can instantly jump back to that point and have the same amount of health as when you placed it. If you are at full health when you set it, you will be at full health again. Reaver gets a focus ability that can give attack speed, life steal, and extra damage. AT tier 3 it gives 30% bonus to all 3.

If you combine some of these with other abilities and passives you can be invulnerable to damage for a time, kill stuff faster, and heal up over time and on kill. It is super easy to retain health in this game. Much easier than to have a party member sit there casting cure on your tank.

Overall, I've adjusted and don't find it to be a huge issue, and I kind of like this. I've also been looking into the templar and other advanced skill trees--now, at level 15 and 60+ hours in, I still don't have all the pieces for any of the training disciplines, which I find annoying: templar, still missing the book; reaver, still missing one of the token deals that drops from the elites that you kill.

It's just those occasional situations where the story traps you in a zone and you end up in sustained fights where, without potions, it's tough. Granted, most of my party is undergeared because I am finding zero tier 3 materials--well, not enough anyway. It's getting annoying. Plus, I find crafting is just too time-consuming now, So I don't spend much time shuffling things around.

I also run around with half health anyway, as a shield warrior. I just keep guard up as much as possible and it's rarely a problem. My party is always eating the potions, though. I've always got a barrier mage in the party, as well.

It might be worth while to invest in barrier to get the resurrection spell that fully heals the party member you cast it on. I do recall that first fight and wonder why my party wasn't replenished too, luckily my party was strong by then.

That last one you mentioned, I started to fight it, but I eventually just protected my main character as he loaded up the treb. I assumed that it may have been meant to be done that way. Winning the fight was not the objective.

Yep, all of the mages are invested into the barrier tree. I honestly don't know how to play this game without it--well, can maybe go all warrior and keep guard up constantly. Or 3 warriors + dagger Rogue. All melee is bad you say? I put a guard-on-hit mastercraft material on my Rogue's armor and it's pretty awesome.

 

[bystander36]

Yep, all of the mages are invested into the barrier tree. I honestly don't know how to play this game without it--well, can maybe go all warrior and keep guard up constantly. Or 3 warriors + dagger Rogue. All melee is bad you say? I put a guard-on-hit mastercraft material on my Rogue's armor and it's pretty awesome.

I also put a guard on hit slot on my mage. I was surprised it worked.

I wouldn't advise going with 4 melee. 3 melee is too much from my experience. 2 is the sweet spot. If you have too many melee on a target, they constantly get in each others way and they end up spending all their time running around trying to get in range.

 

[cmdrdredd]

Overall, I've adjusted and don't find it to be a huge issue, and I kind of like this. I've also been looking into the templar and other advanced skill trees--now, at level 15 and 60+ hours in, I still don't have all the pieces for any of the training disciplines, which I find annoying: templar, still missing the book; reaver, still missing one of the token deals that drops from the elites that you kill.

It's just those occasional situations where the story traps you in a zone and you end up in sustained fights where, without potions, it's tough. Granted, most of my party is undergeared because I am finding zero tier 3 materials--well, not enough anyway. It's getting annoying. Plus, I find crafting is just too time-consuming now, So I don't spend much time shuffling things around.

I also run around with half health anyway, as a shield warrior. I just keep guard up as much as possible and it's rarely a problem. My party is always eating the potions, though. I've always got a barrier mage in the party, as well.




Yep, all of the mages are invested into the barrier tree. I honestly don't know how to play this game without it--well, can maybe go all warrior and keep guard up constantly. Or 3 warriors + dagger Rogue. All melee is bad you say? I put a guard-on-hit mastercraft material on my Rogue's armor and it's pretty awesome.

Except for the time you hit a magic barrier and have no mage. So you have to run all the way back after swapping members.

 

[zinfamous]

I also put a guard on hit slot on my mage. I was surprised it worked.

I wouldn't advise going with 4 melee. 3 melee is too much from my experience. 2 is the sweet spot. If you have too many melee on a target, they constantly get in each others way and they end up spending all their time running around trying to get in range.

I much prefer two melee, but I sometimes find myself going with 3 just because of who I want in the party at the time, because some combos are just entertaining for their banter--like Sera and Iron Bull or Sera and Cassandra or Sera and...well anyone. ...my Sera is daggered out because bows are for losers, btw (Varric is my shooty guy)

 

[zinfamous]

Except for the time you hit a magic barrier and have no mage. So you have to run all the way back after swapping members.

yeah, I never would do that. need a warrior/mage/rogue in every party to avoid such frustrations.

 

[ControlD]

I definitely get a Skyrim vibe from DAI as well. Still dislike the silly combat and rigid classes though. Perhaps in a future DA game, they'll scrub 'classes' altogether and go with something more skill based? DAI doesn't like me play the character I really want to.

But then it would no longer be a Dragon Age game. It would be ... Skyrim. The best part of the Dragon Age games is building a party with well rounded skill sets that can handle everything the game throws at you. You get to play all four characters currently in your party. I know some people solo these games, but the mechanics really aren't designed for that and I hope they don't turn the game into something like that in the future.

 

[zinfamous]

But then it would no longer be a Dragon Age game. It would be ... Skyrim. The best part of the Dragon Age games is building a party with well rounded skill sets that can handle everything the game throws at you. You get to play all four characters currently in your party. I know some people solo these games, but the mechanics really aren't designed for that and I hope they don't turn the game into something like that in the future.

aye. I prefer Skyrim for the depth of the world, and the immersion that you get with, well, any ES game.

DA games are about party mechanics and specific class builds. While you will invariably get to a certain style, probably repetitive after a certain point, the combat in DA is still superior. And story. Many parts of DA games are on rails because the primary focus is story--and that's a very good thing. Final Fantasy games were the first that did this so well--open world exploration (even the illusion of it), and solid story. Same could be said for Dragon Warrior, but come one...those were never character-driven.

Also, in DA:I you can always buy the ability point reset from your forge merchant, an unlimited number of times. So, the only build limit your character has is the starting class and your specialization. Warrior and Rogues have such vastly different trees between tank/2 hand dps and ranged/trap/stealth dps that it works out to good variety, imo, on just one character.

I don't know enough about mages, yet, but I feel that the need to stick with a barrier focus for some of your points is limiting. I think the specializations really define mages more than anything...but then it's a barrier + nec or barrier + knight, etc.


DAI is amazing, I would say the best game in a long time--and for me, since Skyrim. I think I still prefer Skyrim because the detail of that world was unparalleled. These DA games have tons of backstory it seems, but with ES games, you don't really get bogged down in court lunacy, which, when piled on top of myth and magic tomfoolery, starts to lose immersion imo. Or, at least, it's just too much to digest and at some point, just feels like it's there for the sake of wanting to be complex. Not that it shouldn't be there...I just like that my choices in Skyrim were to go to the ball if I wanted...didn't really have to...but even if I did, I could down a keg of honeymead prior to going in, insult every jarl, and strip naked and tear ass through the palazzo, murdering everyone present (targets and all guests...well, except the jarls ) without failing the "mission."

that really is a huge difference, imo.

That being said, DA is more story-focused, which is why certain aspects are on rails--and necessarily so. I like that as well. It works best for these games. The open world and free exploration works best for ES games.

 

[escrow4]

Skyrim isn't detailed. Its a rip off of Tolkien (like most High Fantasy) and hits every single fantasy cliche in the book minus the farmhand becoming a god and killing everything evil. The genericness kills it. If you want detail I'd say Witcher. The backstory is what Dragon Age is all about. Its a living actual world with choices and consequences. Its everything the Elder Scrolls will never be.

 

[Bateluer]

Skyrim isn't detailed. Its a rip off of Tolkien (like most High Fantasy) and hits every single fantasy cliche in the book minus the farmhand becoming a god and killing everything evil. The genericness kills it. If you want detail I'd say Witcher. The backstory is what Dragon Age is all about. Its a living actual world with choices and consequences. Its everything the Elder Scrolls will never be.

You may want to play some of the ES games again, and read up on some of the lore. Elder Scrolls has some of the most detailed and extensive lore of any franchise. Tolkien doesn't hold a candle to some modern fantasy settings.

 

[SLU Aequitas]

Skyrim isn't detailed. Its a rip off of Tolkien (like most High Fantasy) and hits every single fantasy cliche in the book minus the farmhand becoming a god and killing everything evil. The genericness kills it. If you want detail I'd say Witcher. The backstory is what Dragon Age is all about. Its a living actual world with choices and consequences. Its everything the Elder Scrolls will never be.

LOL no.

 

[chimaxi83]

Thought this was kind of funny. In the comments was "Let's not forget that the budget of TW2 was probably one tracksuit and a 12-pack of beer." lol

 

[Midwayman]

I think it's somewhat decently balanced, but the problem with being reliant on potions is getting stuck in a long sequence, unprepared, and maybe reaching an impassable point.

examples 1--my most difficult fight yet:

Spoiler

The Mission at the ball to save the empress...which found me wandering around for hours playing fetch, which was annoying, but I digress.

Once you get to the boss fight at the end of that, I had zero potions...mainly because I had gone to Skyhold, activated quest, then jumped into that Mission. when you travel to camps, all of your healing potions are immediately restocked, apparently not so with Skyhold, as I assumed that had been happening all along. Anyway, I go through the halls of that mission with relatively easy fights, so I never needed the pots, but then the boss fight happens, I'm stuck with 1 heal, 2 heal mist grenades, and about 3 recovery potions for my party (been doing the upgrades so my elfroot stock has been going elsewhere).

Got my ass handed to me 4 times, before going back to an autosave before the long cutscene. I eventually found one supply restock hidden in the kitchen area--but that's another thing. When heals are classically determined by mana that regenerates, you tend to think of healing as an unlimited potential going into a fight--or, at least, you start at 100%, with an opportunity to recover healing potential if needed.

Not so with this mechanic. I like that it offers a different component to fights, but ffs--at least make the various supply boxes in certain maps multi-use things (maybe 2 or 3 uses before depleted).

...This was also a problem on the

Spoiler

assault on Haven--that final group at the trebuchet. I basically spent 10 minutes kiting one wraith with a 5% health Solas, barrier up and plink the dude with my 23 damage. lol

While I agree getting stuck in places without pots is annoying, its the needless walking that really pisses me off. Finish sealing up a rift or two and I'm out of pots. I have to fast travel back to camp and then hoof it back out to the mission area. Normally that would be a sit for a minute and cast heal, or hit the rest button. It adds a lot of really boring time into the game. I don't mind the mechanic so much otherwise...well other than the odd getting into a boss fight without having a fresh stock. They really should have put a restock crate at the save point before a boss fight .

 

[bystander36]

I think a decent solution to the lack of healing, and constant restock, is to simply allow your party to heal up between battles. With a decent party, even on hard, you don't have to suck that many potions in battle, but after the battle, you often have to heal up with them, further using them up. If the party could heal between battles, your potion use would go down a lot and it wouldn't effect the challenge of the battles.

 

[zinfamous]

Skyrim isn't detailed.

Its a rip off...

of Tolkien (like most High Fantasy) and hits every single fantasy cliche in the book minus the farmhand becoming a god and killing everything evil. The genericness kills it. If you want detail I'd say Witcher. The backstory is what Dragon Age is all about. Its a living actual world with choices and consequences. Its everything the Elder Scrolls will never be.

I separated those two points because the arguments have nothing to do with each other.

Not sure how you define detail, but if you think the world that exists in the background of ES games, on top of the visual worlds that are designed for these games lack detail, then you must live in some 5D world that no one else can experience

As I mentioned, the story (in ES games) isn't very great and that was my point--it's a very different type of RPG that focuses on do whatever you want--meaning, whatever the hell you want. You aren't forced into the story. Different games do these different things in their own way. Witcher (which, imo, lacks significantly in world design and detail--yes, things look pretty, but you are on a CoD-like rail the entire game, so you only ever see what you are meant to see) and DA games are story-driven. DA and ES games have a far more developed world than the Witcher series, which doesn't drown you in the lore as do the others.


Detail: I'm talking about the world, lore and the gameplay.

You are talking about story. I think very few will deny that the ES stories are rather weak, but that is pretty much what you have to live with in a game that encourages free play and exploring many, many, many layers of different storylines--which is another thing that ES does better than anyone else: while there is one main storyline, you have dozens of extended and yes--detailed--storylines running the background in which you can participate.

 

[zinfamous]

Thought this was kind of funny. In the comments was "Let's not forget that the budget of TW2 was probably one tracksuit and a 12-pack of beer." lol

eh, pretty dumb comparison, imo. For one thing: team of 500 Harvard-educated programmers? Seems like a description ripped entirely from one's ass.

Second: whatever system is generating that pic from DAI should be updated from the ~2009 hardware, and push something beyond ultralow settings.

Third: seems like that Witcher pic is from a cutscene? Also, lighting and shading is always important. Everything looks good with dark shades and dim lighting--this is why some of the most realistic visual effects have always leaned towards darker tones against dark backgrounds (think Golum in LoTR vs how terrible Jar Jar looked in comparison).

Fourth: DA games give you a world that you can explore. Witcher puts a carrot in front of your face and keeps you on a path; so you compromise with depth. Why not compare the character faces in DAI and Witcher 2? Virtually identical, if not slightly better in the newer game.


Though I like the descriptions regarding the CDPR team--those guys are pretty awesome and much respect for their stuff.

 

[chimaxi83]

eh, pretty dumb comparison, imo. For one thing: team of 500 Harvard-educated programmers? Seems like a description ripped entirely from one's ass.

Second: whatever system is generating that pic from DAI should be updated from the ~2009 hardware, and push something beyond ultralow settings.

Third: seems like that Witcher pic is from a cutscene? Also, lighting and shading is always important. Everything looks good with dark shades and dim lighting--this is why some of the most realistic visual effects have always leaned towards darker tones against dark backgrounds (think Golum in LoTR vs how terrible Jar Jar looked in comparison).

Fourth: DA games give you a world that you can explore. Witcher puts a carrot in front of your face and keeps you on a path; so you compromise with depth. Why not compare the character faces in DAI and Witcher 2? Virtually identical, if not slightly better in the newer game.


Though I like the descriptions regarding the CDPR team--those guys are pretty awesome and much respect for their stuff.

Lol dude, I didn't post it to be dissected. I just took it at face value. Bioware, an established, BIG developer, versus CDPR, the equivalent (at the time) of a sweatshop. I love CDPR

 

[zinfamous]

Lol dude, I didn't post it to be dissected. I just took it at face value. Bioware, an established, BIG developer, versus CDPR, the equivalent (at the time) of a sweatshop. I love CDPR

hey, I feel the same way....just saying is all. Just think the fanboys do themselves a disservice by using a terrible example to justify a fair point.


anyway, questions about Reaver:

--so I specced my sword/board warrior into reaver (I like the idea of templar, but it doesn't do much more than what I was already doing; champion is just godawful boring, if not a very good discipline. I like Blackwall in the party because he's a solid wall...but I just can't imagine playing that build)

Anyway, for some reason, Rampage is never available to me. With full tier one focus, and full tier two focus, I can never activate Rampage in battle, even with full stamina. My Inquisitor fade blast focus skill works fine, all the other party members' focus skills work, but I can't activate rampage. Something that I'm missing that was not listed in the skill description?

Also, does guard count as HP? meaning, in Reaver skill/damage calculations, is guard considered a separate attribute to HP? My thought is to run out with half HP or less, keep guard up full (and with a barrier mage), all the while taking advantage of the reaver DPS. I know that guard essentially acts as a 2nd health bar, but I assume it is addressed as a separate function from HP...

 

[cmdrdredd]

I separated those two points because the arguments have nothing to do with each other.

Not sure how you define detail, but if you think the world that exists in the background of ES games, on top of the visual worlds that are designed for these games lack detail, then you must live in some 5D world that no one else can experience

As I mentioned, the story (in ES games) isn't very great and that was my point--it's a very different type of RPG that focuses on do whatever you want--meaning, whatever the hell you want. You aren't forced into the story. Different games do these different things in their own way. Witcher (which, imo, lacks significantly in world design and detail--yes, things look pretty, but you are on a CoD-like rail the entire game, so you only ever see what you are meant to see) and DA games are story-driven. DA and ES games have a far more developed world than the Witcher series, which doesn't drown you in the lore as do the others.


Detail: I'm talking about the world, lore and the gameplay.

You are talking about story. I think very few will deny that the ES stories are rather weak, but that is pretty much what you have to live with in a game that encourages free play and exploring many, many, many layers of different storylines--which is another thing that ES does better than anyone else: while there is one main storyline, you have dozens of extended and yes--detailed--storylines running the background in which you can participate.

That doesn't even include reading the notes, books, tomes, scrolls, and such scattered around the world. Skyrim had more lore and side story to discover than the fantasy section at Barnes and Noble. Dragon age appears to have a lot of codex entries to discover and read. Not as much as the ES games though at first glance.

 

[StinkyPinky]

Thought this was kind of funny. In the comments was "Let's not forget that the budget of TW2 was probably one tracksuit and a 12-pack of beer." lol

Pretty harsh. The dragons in this game are visually very impressive and have great animations. Perhaps not quite the same texture quality but let's not forget this game has huge maps and more going on in it than Witcher 2.

 

[Bateluer]

Third: seems like that Witcher pic is from a cutscene? Also, lighting and shading is always important. Everything looks good with dark shades and dim lighting--this is why some of the most realistic visual effects have always leaned towards darker tones against dark backgrounds (think Golum in LoTR vs how terrible Jar Jar looked in comparison).

Thats not from a cutscene. Saskia looks like that in her dragon form in game.

Fourth: DA games give you a world that you can explore. Witcher puts a carrot in front of your face and keeps you on a path; so you compromise with depth. Why not compare the character faces in DAI and Witcher 2? Virtually identical, if not slightly better in the newer game.

Only DAI is really an open world. DAO's maps were much smaller, and DA2 was basically in a single map. TW2 wasn't as open as DAI, but it didn't need to be for the time either.

Faces though, they both look good. Its just that TW did it three years earlier than DAI.

 

[bystander36]

Thats not from a cutscene. Saskia looks like that in her dragon form in game.

Are you sure about that? When you kill major targets in TW2, you get a death blow cutscene, and that clearly looks like a death blow cutscene.

 

[Bateluer]

Are you sure about that? When you kill major targets in TW2, you get a death blow cutscene, and that clearly looks like a death blow cutscene.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ske-5uMkVXE

Edit. Video to show dragon, not the players skill. He kinda sucks.

 

[bystander36]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ske-5uMkVXE

Edit. Video to show dragon, not the players skill. He kinda sucks.

Yeah, if you go to the end, it is a cutscene. Very clearly a cutscene.

It may be animated, rather than using a video, but it is a custscene. The player is not in control when he gets impaled by the tree branch.

 

[Bateluer]

Yeah, if you go to the end, it is a cutscene. Very clearly a cutscene.

It may be animated, rather than using a video, but it is a custscene. The player is not in control when he gets impaled by the tree branch.

Its an in engine cutscene, and not much of an improvement over the regular gameplay. Granted, I do run the game at ultra settings and 1440p.

Its taken years for others to catch up to Witcher 2's visuals, there's no question on that.