Dragon Age: Inquisition

[Nepenthe]

I don't know if I have the patience for a Nightmare run.  Mainly because I don't trust the party AI to do the smart thing in combat, and I don't have the patience to micromanage the entire party for a prolonged combat encounter.

Haven't had to micro much so far, but still early days. Have wiped only once even so. Still, this issn't what I'd call fun, but I've suffered through one of these to get 100 % in every bioware game where it's needed.

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

Doesn't Nightmare slap on random resistances?

[Cultist]

Finished and uninstalled it at last.

The game is a textbook example of bad design, bad writing, bad UI, bad combat mechanics and bad taste.

- Choices and consequences? None. Nothing you do matter. Even choice between mages and templars are simply replacing skins of some NPCs standing in your stronghold.

- Main story? Twilight-level writing. Hey, we occupied an empty keep in a middle of nowhere. Conscript some farmers to our ranks. Inquisition army now can dictate their will to every nation in Thedas hurr. And so on and so on. "Press X to pay respects" everywhere.

- Main villain? Enjoy your I AM A GOD HURRR Skeletor.

- Quests? 99% - fetch and kill 20 goats quests.

- The world? Enormous empty areas with running goats and nothing but combat encounters and animals respawning MMO style.

- Exploring? There is nothing but combat. maximum one or two noncombat encounters for each area.

- Bosses? Huge HP bloats plus repositioning quickly your chars.

- Companions? Forgettable, bland and poorly written. Apparently catering to deviant minorities, being a homo or black does not automaticly make your characters good or interesting.

- Crafting? Collect 35 elfroots to upgrade potions. Collect 30 iron/obsidian/other metal to craft a Common Rusty Sword of Mediocricy.

- Agents and War table? 15 hours to complete a mission. No negative consequences, every war table mission is rewarding. 95% of all rewards is a trash items and 100 golds, plus useless influence. Power? I ended the game with 150+ power. Useless resource. There was a mission where you had to bribe some guy to get something....and you get money for it as a reward, of course without spending a coint - you just click start mission and wait X minutes\hours.

- Customization? None of it matters. Three available stronghold customization are purely cosmetic.

- Final boss battle. Here's the worst part. None of your choices matter. In Origins, you had different allies based on your choices, your entire party had different missions. DA:I final battle - choose three companions and go. Final boss battle is a three phase battle where he moves to the different area after losing some HP. Won by holding R. Extremely rewarding.

 

Everything in this game is half-assed. MMO gameplay and mechanics in a single-player game. Grinding EVERYWHERE. To appease "new audiences" and attract more players Bioware decided to stroke players' ego. Oh Maker, that's Inquisitor himself! Hoe glorious he is! How powerful and mighty! Who we are to oppose this unstoppable, beautiful, wise, cunning and muscular paragon of a man! Such Bioware writing will plague you for entire game.

Goddamn, even retardo BSN, filled with fanbois, basement dwellers and manchildren begin to complain about this fabulous garbage, which is soldified the truth, that Bioware finally took the throne of a leading RPG fastfood manufacturer.

[Orogun01]

@Cultist:

I never understood how people could waste time playing a game out of spite, it seems from your post that you played the game just to be critical of it. DA:I is nowhere near perfect and has some glaring issues but the fact that you dislike everything; even what they did well, is telling of your bias.

[Woldan]

I have about 25k gold now and I can't find anything useful to spend it on, the stores only sell trash. Such a let down. 

[Hurlshort]

@Cultist:

 

I never understood how people could waste time playing a game out of spite, it seems from your post that you played the game just to be critical of it. DA:I is nowhere near perfect and has some glaring issues but the fact that you dislike everything; even what they did well, is telling of your bias.

 

He mentioned earlier that it is an OCD type thing.  Tough game to get stuck with, weighing in at 100 hours or so.

[GhostofAnakin]

I've never understood how someone can have such a hatred for a game and not see a single redeeming quality in it.  I can't think of a single game I've played that I utterly hated 99% of it.  Some games just weren't very fun, but I didn't find every aspect of it mind-numbingly loathsome.  *shrugs*

[CoM_Solaufein]

Have to wonder about how they figure on these encounters you have in the game in regards to battles. After much effort I defeated the Emerald Graves dragon. It was time consuming if anything since that dragon has a lot of XPs. Now I go to the fade rift that is nearby, it has a bunch of despair and shade demons and I keep getting my party wiped out every time I fight them. Level 12-13 party. I have two mages in the party that have fire based staves and I keep switching back and forth between the two to use fire based spells on the despair demons, a fighter and my character a melee rogue. I can get past the first encounter of that fade rift but when the second party materializes I keep getting killed off. Seems to me this particular rift is far more powerful than that dragon I just took care off.

 

 

Thanks for the suggestions about this. I had to rethink my tactics and use some different personnel. I took control of Dorian and made use of his higher abilities I gave him like Blizzard and Fire Mine. I never tried out the mage mines before. Now I'll make good use of them. They made that battle very short with their damage potential.

[CoM_Solaufein]

I've never understood how someone can have such a hatred for a game and not see a single redeeming quality in it.  I can't think of a single game I've played that I utterly hated 99% of it.  Some games just weren't very fun, but I didn't find every aspect of it mind-numbingly loathsome.  *shrugs*

 

I can think of one, Pool of Radiance 2. It was the biggest let down of any game that I played. I kept track of its development in various gaming magazines, bought the collectors edition only to get a bug filled, unplayable game.

[MrBrown]

Doesn't Nightmare slap on random resistances?

 

They actually exists on all difficulty levels, on Nightmare they just usually end up lowering your damage to 1.

 

Just means you have to put a bit more planning to using mages.

[Cultist]

@Cultist:

 

I never understood how people could waste time playing a game out of spite, it seems from your post that you played the game just to be critical of it. DA:I is nowhere near perfect and has some glaring issues but the fact that you dislike everything; even what they did well, is telling of your bias.

When I start a game I have to finish it. Partly for myself, partly in hopes that in the end things may get better - in Wasteland 2, for example, first part was kind of meh, but second one was significantly better. With DA:I it never gets better. Gladly, I never spend a lot of time on grinding and used amulet of power exploit to finish the game as fast as possible.

[ManifestedISO]

I feel bad. Haven't touched it for weeks. Still in the H'Lands. Too many quest markers. Not enough Cassandra. How soon is now. 

[Nepenthe]

I have about 25k gold now and I can't find anything useful to spend it on, the stores only sell trash. Such a let down.

The good stuff is concentrated on a couple of vendors, is mostly schematics and you often need the special wares perk for the best store items.

[MrBrown]

 

I have about 25k gold now and I can't find anything useful to spend it on, the stores only sell trash. Such a let down.

The good stuff is concentrated on a couple of vendors, is mostly schematics and you often need the special wares perk for the best store items.

 

 

Buy the 10k item from that shop at the 3rd level of Val Royeux.

[Woldan]

I bought the 10k gold item, not what I expected, lol. Still need to do the operation.

 

And I spent most of my perks on secrets, too bad the ''Special vendor'' perk actually does something, I think I

've already acquired most agents available in the game.

[Serrano]

There is a vendor in skyhold on the way to the stable that lets you buy experience for the inquisition, in case you wanted to get some more of the useful perks and their prerequisites.

Edited January 4, 2015 by Serrano

[Nepenthe]

I bought the 10k gold item, not what I expected, lol. Still need to do the operation.And I spent most of my perks on secrets, too bad the ''Special vendor'' perk actually does something, I think I've already acquired most agents available in the game.

I bought the 10k gold item, not what I expected, lol. Still need to do the operation.And I spent most of my perks on secrets, too bad the ''Special vendor'' perk actually does something, I think I've already acquired most agents available in the game.

Frankly the vendors apart from a certain mabari (who has the change, remember) and the skyhold merchants have very little that wouldn't theoretically be beaten by a lucky random drop. Or even most of the fixed ones...

[MrBrown]

Guys, remember that influence maxes at level 20. You don't want to spend all your perks on merchant bonuses. I speak from experience.


In general about money, I prefer having extra money to having no money at all. In DA2, you had very very little money... You could never afford much of the cool stuff. I often cheated myself extra money to just try other items. DA:O had a pretty good money balance, IMO (not counting the DLC items that could be sold for lots of gold). If you weren't stingy, you might not have been able to afford everything... but if you were, you could.

[Woldan]

Armors have been lackluster so far, all those I think look good are vastly underpowered (even with high tier crafting), like the heavy Orlesian army armor, or the Adventurer armor. I'm playing a rogue and the medium armors suck even more, I think the last 50 hours I haven't changed the medium warden scout armor even once.

All those medium armor coats look horrible and stupid, stupid as in witch-hunter stupid.

 

I liked most armors in DAI, DA2 were good too, same with Mass Effect 2 & 3, but DA3 suits really suck so far. 

[Serrano]

So what did you guys make of the Hawke questline? I imagine if Alastair stayed a warden then that quest becomes a lot more interesting even if the content doesn't really change. It was definately one of my favourite bits in the game though, I just wish it had been longer.

[Volourn]

"I never understood how people could waste time playing a game out of spite, it seems from your post that you played the game just to be critical of it. DA:I is nowhere near perfect and has some glaring issues but the fact that you dislike everything; even what they did well, is telling of your bias."
 

Because he actually likes the game. He's trying to be edgy and keep the 'coolness'.  Ranting and hating  is an internet pasttime. Afterall, you cna't know for sure if a game sucks unless you played it 7 times.

[Nepenthe]

Armors have been lackluster so far, all those I think look good are vastly underpowered (even with high tier crafting), like the heavy Orlesian army armor, or the Adventurer armor. I'm playing a rogue and the medium armors suck even more, I think the last 50 hours I haven't changed the medium warden scout armor even once.

All those medium armor coats look horrible and stupid, stupid as in witch-hunter stupid.

 

I liked most armors in DAI, DA2 were good too, same with Mass Effect 2 & 3, but DA3 suits really suck so far.

 

Ditto helmets. Also due to the rng dependency of the game, nice looking weapons are also hard to craft, but they are at least mostly in the game.

 

I hope you've at least gotten the unique dragon-dropped warden armor... Or the schematic.

[Woldan]

I'm level 21 and I have yet to kill a dragon. I just tried the one in the emerald graves and I got killed after reducing its health by 1/3. I'm literally steamrolling all the treats in the game by now, 3 pride demons at once down in less than 60 seconds, 2 corrupted giants at once no problem  but the dragons kill the crap out of me.

Partly because of the stupid and nonsensical AI.

[NOK222]

Get a knight enchanter in your party. Vivienne I guess, she's pretty much invincible. Additionally, use that heal skill she has with one focus. 

[Nepenthe]

I'm level 21 and I have yet to kill a dragon. I just tried the one in the emerald graves and I got killed after reducing its health by 1/3. I'm literally steamrolling all the treats in the game by now, 3 pride demons at once down in less than 60 seconds, 2 corrupted giants at once no problem but the dragons kill the crap out of me.

Partly because of the stupid and nonsensical AI.

Hard for me to say, I killed my first one at 14. Just need a mage with a staff and spec in the opposing damage, really.

 

Edit: and I rotated mostly between varric and the mage, 2h inquisitor and cassandra fared for themselves...

Edited January 4, 2015 by Nepenthe