Dragon Age 3: Inquistion

[Kibble]

Still pretty early in the game, but Archer rogue is pretty silly right now. Start out most fights with Stealth+Full Draw for ~800 damage(1600 crits).

[Teknique]

Archer rogue and mage are where the damage is at

Started a new game, went mage. Gonna see how this is. Im not liking dual dagger rogue too much compared to archer.

[Vagrant]

http://www.dragonage.com/?sf33800207...=1416427707174

New online quest added that will give you a new weapon pack to be used in game for anyone that is interested.

[Obsidian]

Neat, thanks.

The Flames of the Inquisition heavy armor/great sword look dope as hell, for the record.

[Vagrant]

How is the flames Sword? The staff was incredibly underwhelming. Never even used it in battle on my mage as I found two better ones lying around in crates in Haven. The light armor for mage I'm still using though.

The weapons from that Red Reaper quest I linked seem to only be Sword, Dagger, and Staff level 7's with pretty good stats. No bow apparently for some reason or the site just didn't display it.

[Krandor]

Archer rogue and mage are where the damage is at

Started a new game, went mage. Gonna see how this is. Im not liking dual dagger rogue too much compared to archer.

The way healing works in this game (where you only have a limited pool of potions at any one time) works against melee classes. 2 Hander Warrior could be worth it in some situations for the huge AoE damage they dish out, but Dagger rogue just doesn't do it for me at all.

For the time being (like 7-8 hours in) I've been rolling with Blackwall (tank) , Iron Bull (2 hander) , Vivienne, and myself as an archer.

[BadKarma]

Anybody start off on hard? How is it if so.

Takes really long to kill shit, have to plan out your potions more, but not too terrible

[Wulfgang]

How is the flames Sword? The staff was incredibly underwhelming. Never even used it in battle on my mage as I found two better ones lying around in crates in Haven. The light armor for mage I'm still using though.

The weapons from that Red Reaper quest I linked seem to only be Sword, Dagger, and Staff level 7's with pretty good stats. No bow apparently for some reason or the site just didn't display it.

They're all crap. I ended up using my Flames sword for about 15 minutes.

And non-spoiler newbie tip: go to Val as soon as the option is available (lv 4 for me).

1) There's two sidequests / jaunts after the first CS where you can pick up two additional followers. You can then go back to the Hinterlands and continue as normal, but at least you have more party options.

2) Unless you got lucky with drops, buy a mage staff from the vendor on the right after entering along with a grip amd staff blade upgrade. Mega boost to my mage DPS considering Im using two right now.

[Wulfgang]

And I really wish I had rolled a mage/archer or at least a 2H melee. I'm going to bang out the first playthrough sword and board because I'm stubborn, but it's just annoying to play.

[Teknique]

Wulf there is a respect item at the blacksmith if u are a warrior

[Teknique]

Refunds all choices for whatever class you are. Just can't change classes

[Wulfgang]

Good point. I've started enjoying the Sword + Board more in the past few hours. Best example is my next piece of starter advice: If you end up trying to do the mires / swamps / rescue soldiers at LV 5-6 like I did just because you wandered down there, the last rift portal is like fucking nearly impossible. All the mobs in the swamp are generally level 8, but the last rift is all LV 12. I got past the first phase every time, but the 2nd phase has a big skeleton knight that would take 75% of my WAR's HP w/ Shield and PDT-20% from the front. It also had the damn WAR grappling hook ability so you can't run. I finally won by giving one of my mages Dispel, eliminating two of the add spawns preemptively with that on the 2nd phase, and then just spamming Guard building moves with potions + regen pots. Really was the first time in this game that I've even blinked (playing lolnormal, but still it was hard as shit).

[Koul]

so, I was torn on the lesbian and gay characters. But I absolutely love em. Sera is batshit crazy and hilarious and even though I hate Dorians stache he's pretty interesting. Also, Vivienne's bitchiness is top tier. Love these freaking characters. First game where I talked to everyone in camp and actually cared what they had to say. I would suggest talking to Sera about the rest of the group once you unlock her. She has some funny banter about everyone. I wanna like Iron Bull but all I see is Freddie Prinze Jr :S

I wasn't gunna fuck Dorian but he's growing on me. I'll probably end up rubbing sticks with him on my man mage next game

[Vagrant]

So has anyone managed to knock off that damn dragon in the Hinterlands yet? Tried again today after clearing everything else there I could find outside of Redcliffe itself and obviously didn't fare all that well still at level 8.

[Krandor]

I don't even know where the Hinterlands dragon is. I ran into the Storm Coast one last night, who is oh so conveniently placed in the middle of some quest objectives.

[Tidane]

I saw the Storm Coast dragon, but it flew away and I never ran into it again.

Hinterlands dragon is southeast of the Redcliffe gate. There is a camp and the dragon is north of the camp. This dragon also ran away while I was competing done quest in the area and wouldn't come back. Perhaps a glitch, so I'll have to go back later. For that one, I stacked fire resist gear (45% on my character, a mage, and 30% on my tank). Everyone died pretty quickly from fireballs anyway. I lived because it didn't hit my running character.

I did just get to Skyhold (level 12), so I'll probably knock out a few more quests and see about crafting some actual gear before trying again (if I can even get them to spawn again).

That said, fuck this consolized tragedy. The game itself isn't terrible, but almost everything about the game appears like it was put together to spit in the face of people who liked the first game. If I hadn't gone in with the knowledge that this is a post Mass Effect 2/3 and DA2 game, I would've been immediately turned off.

To start, no support for mods or texture overrides. We knew this to be the case pre-launch, which is nice, but the reasoning for it is trash. Everything gets blamed on Frostbite. They tried to Skyrim up the game and took basically the worst part (see below) and missed the good. Some might argue that a "sort of open world" doesn't mean Skyrim and I completely agree. What I mean is they are continuing their appeal to the casual console audience and lack the factor that made the game great on PC (mods).

The tactical camera is absolutely horrid. I tried to think of a redeeming factor for it, but even the existence of it wasn't enough. There are a few bugs that they've mentioned on Twitter that they're looking into, but that doesn't come close to covering the problems. The lack of zoom is the easiest to point towards. The default angle is useless as well, and changing that angle often leaves you in a view that looks suspiciously like an over the shoulder view. I'd rather geometry be broken and unpolished when zooming out than having the cumbersome tactical camera. Calling it that makes me a bit angry, because it is in no way tactical (other than displaying information like weaknesses and debuffs). You can't click on characters to change to them. If you pause and try to switch to the tactical view, it is hit or miss. If a character is interacting with certain objects, you can't switch at all. Tactical. Nope.

Tactics are also a bastardized version of what they used to be. Set a spirit mage to defend someone and he forgets there is a rest of the party. Melees get stuck at a range and don't attack. Ranged run into the fray to make sure they're close enough to get hit by things they shouldn't. Allied characters get stuck on the terrain in seemingly random ways. If you try to change characters, the screen goes black and teleports the entire party to that character, so you just have to run away or summon your horse to get them to disappear and reappear at you. Terrible AI coupled with terrible tactics view means I'm never playing this on a high difficulty again because it just isn't fun.

The combat was absolutely designed for the console experience. Hold to auto attack is such a stupid thing. It isn't engaging in any way and just serves as another annoyance. I want to move easily, but instead I have to hold down a button to attack and then be rooted during the animation. What purpose does it serve except to be annoying? I'm having real difficulty understanding why they would try to implement it again after DA2 showed people (on the consoles) didn't like it. Have you tried using and AoE in non tactics mode? When the targeting reticle is up, you can't move. There had to be a setting for that, right? I couldn't find it. A minor thing, but it just shows a lack of care and polish for the PC, which only gets worse.

The UI takes every terrible design direction from Skyrim and turns it up to lyrium. Why, when I select a party, do I have to scroll through a bunch of cards to pick my party? DAO let me quickly select and entire party with four clicks. Now, if I want to pick Varric, Solas, and Iron Bull I either get to click select click click click select click select or d space d d d d space. Ugly and inefficient. Would you like to manage your inventory? I would, but it is so haphazardly throw together that I find it difficult to believe anyone actually used this before releasing it. To start, there is never enough information in screen at once. Most of the screen is blank or graphics. I have more than enough room to display useful things on the screen, Bioware. Don't make me scroll through a list of items with only give visible at a time. There are very few filters, so you can't see only usable items, sort by stats, damage type, or anything. Filters are weapon type and armor type. Have an accessory that boosts a particular ability and want to know if a character actually had that ability? Queue exiting the full screen menus to get to the one that can tell you that. The valuables tab, which you may think is a junk tab, actually contains items used in certain quests. What?

On top of that, the mouse doesn't work correctly in even the most basic scenarios. Try using the journal. See the drop down icon next to the third item? Click it. Congrats, you've opened the first list because that was the selected item when you clicked. You actually need to click on the third item to select it, then you can open the list. Left the screen? Everything resets to closed. When moving through the world, the right mouse click will often stop responding and you'll have to release it and press it again for it to work. This also impacts dialogues, where you went be able to select anything until you right click. Happens to me fairly often in the middle of conversations. Since auto attack is mapped to left click by default, I have no idea how to turn the camera while running without turning my character. Probably have to hold some other modifier key, but I'm so defeated at this point that I just don't want to look. Speaking of modifiers, I can't map commands to my multi button mouse or to commands with a modifier plus key. Just me or something else they regressed on? DAO let me map my mouse correctly. Additionally, why can't I press F after interacting with a corpse to loot all (and why isn't there a damn loot all option)? Because I have to press space to jump/confirm and F to interact. Glad they're separate, but can't F act as loot all in that window? No secondary key bindings either, but after the rest of it, do you really expect it?

You can't click to move or click to move to and interact outside of the "tactical" camera. You can't hold left and right mouse to move. Both are small things that just really show the lack of care. Left and right to move is slightly fixable by mapping auto run to the mouse (than god for custom mapping software for mice). Would you like to click on something in the world to see what it is (maybe the level)? Enter tactical, move camera so you can see monster, hover mouse. Problems that only exists because auto attack isn't, well, automatic.

I am not a fan of the dialogue wheel, either. I like that the numbers for selection are visible, but I prefer a list. It is much easier on me, but that is a preference that I imagine wouldn't be shared by those playing on a console or with a controller. Another reason for a PC UI and options, I guess.

The world is pretty and there is no arguing that. It beats the pants off Origins and DA2, which had very few areas. The open areas let you feel like there actually a world. Opening doors on houses, going into caves, and exploring is a great start. Ruined in many ways by the terrible follower AI and the ping to search (and you thought this was a nice paragraph). AI was mentioned earlier, but the ping. Ug. Immersion and balance be dammed. Patch in tab to highlight. I don't care if there is a perk to make the search range larger. Running around tapping V only to fail to find the item or realize it is a ladder is infuriating.

Even on the best settings, things are still too shiny. Metals are unnaturally reflective and really detract from some scenes. Not sure what the deal with that is, but I imagine they'd just blame it on Frostbite as well. Seems to be there go to for any sort of technical issue.

The ambient music and sounds are great, with the exception of the pings (search and Origin achievement). The composition, especially during some of the scenes really captures the moment. I wouldn't say it is a good or memorable as the Mass Effect soundtrack, but given that I can't remember any music in DAO or DA2, it is an improvement. The scene when you arrive at Skyhold was one of the ones that highlights this.

The characterization is great. I thought I would hate a lot of the characters based on what I'd seen and heard. Vivienne I do hate, because she is exactly what she is supposed to be. A well written and consistent bitch. I thought Sera would be some "one directional say wacky things ha ha funny right" character and she is, but it feels layered and unforced. That's who she is and it works. Her and The Iron Bull are pretty great together. The Iron Bull manages to be a giant meathead qunari fighter without losing all personality like every other qunari. He loves chopping and cleaving, but he's smart and apparently pretty sensitive, which is hilarious next to some of his dialogue. Cassandra has grown on me, thanks to seeing a person and not someone yelling at Varric for an hour. Solas is exactly what was expected. Still well done, but he feels like the most generic of the group. I've used Blackwall the least, but he seems like he's supposed to be Duncan again. Varric is still great. My Inquisitor is ugly and looks almost exactly like my ME3 Shepard. Guess I have a type.

This is a decent game that had the potential to be one of the best, but was really hamstrung by the design decisions. If it were just a console game, some if the decisions may have made sense, but it still would've only been a decent game. If I were the type to assign arbitrary numbers to pieces of the game:

Graphics: 7/10
The world itself is very pretty. The art direction and detail makes it feel very natural and inviting. The characters, on the other hand, can appear quite reflective, along with metal textures. It is usually pretty minor, but outside with a few characters using armor with metallic parts looks very bad.

Sound: 7/10
Overall solid composition with great direction, but still feels a touch generic; ambient sounds are great when used, but overall they lack the little details to help the world feel alive.

Interfaces: 4/10
Slightly below what I would consider average, but it is not bad enough to make the game unplayable. Personally, the bugs that are present plus the obvious bias towards a console experience makes me want to give this a lower score, but since even a ten point scale makes me very sad for the state of things, I'll round it up to a four. Just know that I'm not happy about it.

Gameplay (Combat): 5/10
There isn't anything special here; combat on higher difficulties takes longer but the lack of tactical control coupled with the action oriented gameplay make it more frustrating than fun.

Gameplay (World): 7/10
Movement within the world is, for the most part, fluid. Control issues like the lack of move-to interact and inability to target without tabbing make it less than ideal. The ping to search feature is a big negative against this and adds frustration thanks to the inconsistency of the highlighting and the nature of when a successful ping occurs (ladders and signs). When you combine that with the sub par horse controls and getting stuck on world geometry, you end up with a mostly positive experience that has a few shortcomings.

Overall: 6/10
The world and lore of the universe is really brought down by the regression in combat and PC controls. If you're a console gamer looking for an action RPG, this is a game you might like. The combat is slower and less responsive than the typical action game, but slightly more tactical (and only very slightly). If you're a PC gamer looking for a good PC experience, I'd hold off to see if they patch any of the defects. If you're someone who loves Bioware and the Dragon Age universe and can play with a controller or an unintuitive PC scheme, pick it up. The world is still there and it does feel like a progression of it. The characterization of main and minor characters delivers on what you would expect from Bioware. There aren't a lot of surprises in dialogue choices and it is much closer to ME3 and DA2 than anything else they've done. The Inquisitor (to this point, in my game) had come off as the weakest of the bunch. She hasn't reached Shepard tier, but there were three games of development for that. Perhaps the rest of the game will raise this character up.

If I needed one statement to sum up what I really think went wrong, it would be style over substance. A strange statement to hear myself make, but the negatives appear to all be related to choosing to be flashy instead of functional or fun.

Disclaimer: 5/10 is average for what I expect out of a game in its genre. I don't subscribe to the 9/10 or bust nonsense. These are also my opinions after playing 30 hours as a human Treynor Mage (that is, the British voice).

Also, I didn't intend to type this and did it on Tapatalk, so apologies for any autocorrections I missed.

[Tyrath]

So I think I got my DA Keep save imported okay. Is there any way early in the game to tell that it went through right?

[Tidane]

So I think I got my DA Keep save imported okay. Is there any way early in the game to tell that it went through right?

I think the Keep well show your progress after it first syncs. Someone mentioned it and I haven't checked yet.

[Cichy]

That's a nice review Tidane. Pretty much agree with you on everything. The upside is the more I played it the more I get used to it and for me it got better. Tactical camera though is an abomination

[Anoat]

Had my first big decision where the game basically tells you that you either get to pick mages or Templars. I picked mages and I already regret it. Luckily I have multiple save files so I'll probably go back and pick Templars to see how that goes.