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playing on the 360. IMPORTED L22 rogue archer about 4 hours

super spoilers are still hidden in case people would like to read my review.

glitches encountered so far:
the mini-map displayed a black gray screen on one random enemy encounter (while traveling to another locale).

enemies were selectable for loot, but no loot was on body

improvements:
the quest symbol above npcs seems to display properly now. however, it makes everything a little to easy. i can clearly see that everyone in town is quest related. will see if i can turn this off or make it current quest only.

pet peeves:
so far there doesn't seem to be any 'party camp' to talk to people (yet). the conversations take place similar to ME2. you select a 'view' or 'object', and the conversation with a character just starts. i screwed it up and thus would have had to reload a great deal because i had no idea to save before the conversation. i know the castle is the party camp, but i couldn't actually start conversations after the clearing the castle. i should definitely will try again though.
EDIT: still cannot talk to these people. why?

does anyone know what gifts to give the party npcs? i will try when i get home.
EDIT: will keep a log in later post

Anders reminds me too much of alistair. lots of humourous dialogue, plus a similar face shape. i just kept thinking omg... maric must have slept with alot of women.

cameos: spoilers

Spoiler

so far.. the ruler of ferelden (cutscene, anora - for me), oghren (party member), and wynne (small quest)

gameplay
exactly the same as the first. i started playing at 10p and didn't realize it was 1.45am when i quit.

there are new specializations, powers, and skills. not going into detail . you may be able to google it anyway.

story decisions (spoilers)

Spoiler

the first 3 partymates i met:, anders, mhairi and oghren drank the blood for the joining. the potential warden lady dies. there some some dialogue before this. maybe i can skip the 'ritual' until later and keep her around.

the thief can be forced to join you or released. out of curiousity, i released him and gave him his family possessions. we'll see where this leads. he did say that he might come back to finish the job.

on the bann daughters ransom, she seems to die immediately (?) unless you select 'show the girl' and 'let her go first'.

the lady with the estate who requests help (treasurer gives the quest). evidently, the templar is getting overwhelmed from the darkspawn. can i actually save them or were they dead on arrival? i'm thinking dead, because the templar has the boots for a special set, but idk.....

i am not going through the game selecting every dialogue choice through reloads. this is just my first run. so please feel free to chime in and tell me how things could have been.

stanolis wrote:
the new wizard apostate guy (party) reminds me too much of alistair. lots of humourous dialogue, plus a similar face shape. i just kept thinking omg... maric must have slept with alot of women.

It's good to be the King.

stanolis wrote:the new wizard apostate guy (party) reminds me too much of alistair. lots of humourous dialogue, plus a similar face shape. i just kept thinking omg... maric must have slept with alot of women.

LOL :laugh: My thoughts exactly. I don't want to overestimate Bioware, but maybe they did this on purpose...

A bug I have encountered is that, if your PC has chosen the Reaver specialization, when you respec (you can do this from a familiar merchant ) you lose the ability to choose Reaver again... However the other specializations are still available. I hope there is a manual or something further on...

I don't have a 'set-in-stone' character I'd like to run through yet.. but I couldn't resist curiousity so I played a lil. And I was shot down when

Spoiler

Mhairi died soo soon

like stanolis mentioned, I hope there is dialogue to beable to keep her around. She looked very promising.. it'd be a real shame to cut her out right from the start.

As far as other parts about the game.. nothing I didn't expect or whining about yet..

That part bummed me out as well.

Spoiler

Mhairi was so far the only DAO character I took an immediate liking to except Shale. Really sucks. Had a spot for her in my main party and all.

gift stuff:
it may be too obvious, but...

+Anders: earrings
+Oghren: liquors
+Velanna: elven rune
+Justice: fade poetry
been afraid to hand over the 'cristof' gifts. they might go to grieving wife. (?)

I didn't pick up their characters, but i assume
+Howe: lockpick set, Howe letter
+Sigrun (haven't met yet):
+Mhairi: kitten?

stolen from gamefaqs (Shadowmaster_M) :
Anders likes: Ser Pounce-A-Lot, the bell collar, the gold earring, the Phylacteries book, the silver bracers, and the scarf.
Ohgren, as you said likes the booze and also the toy horse.
Nathaniel likes: The vase, the Locksmith tools, the whetstone, the sextant, Delilah's letters, and the howe bow.
Valenna like: The Shiny Malachite, the blank journal, the discarded journal, elven runestone, elven trinket, the ornate bowl and the carved greenstone.
Sigrun likes: The spyglass, the toy chariot, the plant, the snow globe and the "Heart of a Warrior" book.
Justice likes: All of items with Kristoff in the name, the lyrium ring, the book about lyrium, the "Verses of Dreams" book and the Elven prayer.

dialogue:
i am just not getting any real dialogue from the npcs. sometimes when i walk into the main hall, dialogue will occur. however, i cannot talk to them like in party camp. when i click of some objects like 'funny tree', i get a surprise dialogue (which i almost always botch). assuming the gift system is exactly the same ie repeated gifts to npc drop the approval boost. where am i supposed to go to talk to these people?

EDIT:
equipment:
OMG. there's a chest for stashing your personal items. if you didn't have the warden DLC. this is a definite improvement.

for my imported characters, i am pretty loaded already. i basically have been saving any equipment with rune slots and special names. all else gets sold off. the pendants and rings loot has been pretty nice.

i would suggest you load your character with master/grandmaster runes before importing over. i haven't found much of them. i guess i'm supposed to make them since it is a new skill. well, too bad.... i'm too lazy

story: spoilers
as the warden-commander, we actually preside over a few criminal cases.

Spoiler

+for the starving farmer, i made him join the army to feed his family and he was really grateful.
+for the nobleman, i had him placed in jail until the investigation was finalized (never, haha!). he was upset, but nothing bad has happened yet.
+ i gave the bridge to the conspirator, but promised to make it up to the other noble. he seemed satisfied.

completely ran through the darkwood swamp (?). i had a really hard time finding one piece of dragon bone.

Spoiler

in the area you find justice, there is a burned out wall/house. if you just look on the other side there is the second to last dragon bone and chest. i missed this spot for over 10 minutes.

oh, justice basically has crap gear, so be sure to load him up with some goodies. i left him with the same mace though.

the aavar stone brothers

Spoiler

well, i convinced the war brother to chill out and sleep. i think the quest was finished. then, i ran over to the magistar. he is still killable and not inactivated. i have not gone back to talk to the brothers to see if this messes anything up.

MAPS:
this is one thing i really like... the larger maps, especially wending woods. walk around for awhile without the loading screens. complete some quests in the same map without all the extra loading.

stanolis wrote:gift stuff:
it may be too obvious, but...

+Anders: earrings
+Oghren: liquors
+Velanna: elven rune
+Justice: fade poetry
been afraid to hand over the 'cristof' gifts. they might go to grieving wife. (?)

I didn't pick up their characters, but i assume
+Howe: lockpick set, Howe letter
+Sigrun (haven't met yet):
+Mhairi: kitten?

does anyone know which gifts go where? i have alot that i haven't been able to fit with a character, and i didn't want waste time testing and reloading.

dialogue:
i am just not getting any real dialogue from the npcs. sometimes when i walk into the main hall, dialogue will occur. however, i cannot talk to them like in party camp. when i click of some objects like 'funny tree', i get a surprise dialogue (which i almost always botch). assuming the gift system is exactly the same ie repeated gifts to npc drop the approval boost. where am i supposed to go to talk to these people?

You can find out who gets certain gifts via dialogues. The kitten, for example, you are pretty much told who to give it to by a specific dialogue. In case you want to know,

Spoiler

the kitten, and the collar you find later, wind up going to Anders.

.Some others are kind of obvious, such as anything with Howe in the name and that letter you find from the lady Howe was trying to save. Also, the Codex gives hints as to what each character might like as well. I would assume that Velanna would want anything that had to do with her sister and what was going on in Wending Wood if you come across anything dealing with that as well.

Dialogue is handled differently in Awakenings. Characters will interact whith specific objects you click on while travelling around and speak to you then. Also, on occasion in the camp area you will sometimes be able to click on something near the character to intiate a dialogue- the Cask behind Ohgren, the picture beside Howe etc. As you said, characters will sometime initiate dialogue with you when you return to the camp area. For example, clicking on the statue of Andraste in your courtyard will trigger a conversation with Anders. As things progress, from time to time you will see an indicator above a characters head in camp that lets you know the character has something to say. I think that is porbably tied in with the characters approval level. You just have to wait on characters to talk to you more than you did in Origins.

i appreciate what your trying to do, but the problem is that i am not getting enough conversation to determine which gift goes where. seriously, i am clicking on everything and i have one had maybe one coversation with each character. i have gotten about 10 hours into this game so far and have cleared the keep, amaranthine, blackswamp, & wending woods (most if not, 100%). is most of their dialogue in their personal quests? i have been putting those off.

i finally cheated and got a partial list amending my earlier post.

If you're looking for a lot of conversations and depth along the lines of the original game, it doesn't seem to be there. These characters are not fleshed out to the same extent. I think some of it is tied into personal quests though. Anders seemed a bit more confortable after I did his quest anyway. His approval along with Ohgrens is the highest in my party right now, and they've been more talkative. Not by a great deal though. I just don't think there are any options for getting to know these characters to the same degree as the original ones. The changes in the system seem to just spread a much smaller pool of dialogues out over a period of time.

it's just harder to get them to start talking without them liking you first or finding the dialogue starters. giving them presents, even though, i wasn't sure what to give helped alot.

game:howe joining

Spoiler

he will ask to join the wardens later if you release him from jail with his family possessions. you do NOT have to force him to become a warden.

finding aura

Spoiler

she is in the chantry temple. even though the quest says 'at her home', she doesn't have one.

woods puzzle:

Spoiler

connect all the outer sones and then all the inner stones, finish with the middle to complete it.

dwarven puzzles

Spoiler

2 unmatching set of rune at each station. click whatever bottom rune to start and find the top runes' mate amongst the other bottom runes.

another glitch i had was a dialogue with no people in it. it also failed to play the first line, so i had no idea how to reply.

Just checking in, is it just me or is awakening tons easier than origins?

I mean, you get sovereigns for practically everything you kill which makes weapons like spellfury and voice of velvet incredible easy to come by, not to talk about the tomes of focus, which gives you the ability to have that cun-rogue and sp-mage in the same party. Also, tomes of focus and fade 30-or-so-bonus points is a bit overpowered.

Admittedly I havn't come further than half the game, so hopefully there'll be some epic fights, but it feels like a letdown when the creatures they have bragged with, such as the infernal golem and the spectral dragons, dies on nightmare on the first try without breaking a sweat while controlling your main character only.

Sure, maybe I shouldn't run around with a 250 spellpower, 200%+ spirit damage mage if I want a challenge, but the game practically begs you to at least try that **** out with those never-ending respec tomes. They should've realized people would become ridiculously strong seeing how they've constructed the game and maybe added another difficulty setting or so.

Also, who the **** designed that spectral dragon? After killing her normally I wanted to try something out, namely kill all but one of those electrical flying balls and then have two mages take turn force-fielding it while I pummeled that big harmless electrical ball into oblivion. Worked perfectly.

Bleh.

Edit: Also, the sentinel armor you get in blackmarsh is so ****ing good-looking. Same with mother's chosen sword. Judgement is running around looking like a bad-ass mother****er while I'm stuck with a mage hat that makes me look like the circle of magi kicked me out because of my sense of fashion.

I've been playing it for about 3 days now (off and on), by no means "full" days.

Exporting can be "odd". My character exported naked (because apparently many "DLC" items do not transfer - or at least they don't *appear* to (literally)). At first I thought: "..eh, I just use some of the other armor in my inventory"- and I did, even though I really liked my Warden Commander Armor. Then I actually looked at my character sheet. :speech: Umm, Armor is at about 70's something.. Apparently the armor benefits (only armor, and resistances) are still there, BUT you can wear any other armor and it all stacks. Me *likey* that bug!

It took one day just to figure out *how* I was going to play it. This leads me to gripe #1 - getting "hit" with all sorts of quests right off the bat without "easing" into anything. In this respect Origins was better. My suggestion is just to put several "quest requesters" on hold before even talking to them.. Keeps you from "hurrying though" the game.

THEN it took me another day to load and replay Origins from an earlier save to organize the equipment I wanted to export over with my character (..and particular emphasis on partnering equipment for my chosen companions).

The next bit was finding the companions that appealed the most (..as a group), and then finding the ability to "respec" those characters while also looking for the specialization tomes. Fortunately the wikia has most of this info. now.. but not when I was looking. For those who don't know, Wades front man sells books that can respec any character.

..I'm an Elf offensive Mage.. so I chose the Female Elf Mage and respec.ed her for more defensive capability - primarily Healing, Hast'ing', and Invigorating.. with Auras galore for an offensive defense. I wanted a rogue, and that came down to 2 companions - I liked the Dwarf and really couldn't put up with Human (..having also played the Human Noble Origin before - left a "bad taste" ). Since the Rogue was a female Dwarf.. the third companion was a "no-brainer": Ogren. I respec.ed these two builds - both are now dual-wielders. Ogren now does a LOT more damage (vs. time) than before, and I added some perks and got rid of the ridiculous "lets Berserk" before every battle (and now is a Champion/Spirit Warrior/Guardian). It seems to be working rather well, and I'm enjoying it.

..And this leads me to the number one thing I like about the game : *respec.*.


Anyway..

I *like* the fact that you don't carry on to many conversations with companions. It's there for story-line and personality. (..the party banter is still there, the good quality voice acting is still there - if with recognizable voices and re-hashed persona's.) It may be a *little* weak, but frankly it's a LOT better than the "go no where" decision-tree dialog of Origins. No romance options seemed reasonably fair.. not for the price of the campaign, but when compared to Origins (and that Origins had them if desired).

I don't like the ease of the battles. There are a few that I've found mildly challenging, but most are much to easy. (..and for a Mage increasing the difficulty just makes it *annoying* with the resistance levels, so that's a poor option.)

I also like the art-work/terrain. It isn't as "flat" as Origins. Plenty of "ups and downs" with a little less generic "sets".

If it weren't for the difficulty and the abrupt start/mega-quest, I'd say this is overall *better* than Origins. (..but it isn't. So if it isn't quite as good, it's at least less tedious.)

where in the game is a kitten? I thought I had been everywhere.

mewp wrote:where in the game is a kitten? I thought I had been everywhere.

SPOILER (highlight to read):

Spoiler

..at the keep in the courtyard area where the houses are (beyond th smithy). It may not "spawn" until after Anders talks about his kitty.. don't know.

It spawned at the begining of the game, for me, actually. A bit behind Samuel.

I missed both on my first playthru, tho... so they are easy to miss.