Dragon Age anyone?

This is a call for aid. If anyone sees a good lore or theory post, do you think you could link me or post it here? I may be planning a longfic that's poss-trespasser focusing on my quizzie trying to stop Solas. Pretty much all lore/speculation is relevant, as I'm going with the idea that many, myself included, wanted, which was for the Quizzie to be the protag of DA4.

 

i'll see what i can find, do you have any specifics in mind?

 

@witchknights stuff about Tevinter, elven gods and the forgotten ones, titans, the nature of spirits... pretty much anything that's interesting that people run across. I'm probably an over ambitious doof, but I want to look at enough theories and lore that I can make a story that seems like it would fit well into the universe and be a satisfying continuation to the story.

 

I try not to snark at mods, but why would anyone do this to Varric

HIS FACE WAS NOT 'DIRTY'. HE HAD PORES AND FACIAL SCRUFF AND AGE LINES. YOU MADE HIM LOOK LIKE A PLASTIC DOLL.

 

not quite as bad, but you can also have plastic doll sera if you so desire!

 

These are intensely creepy to look at?? Holy fuck.

 

Noooo people are SUPPOSED to have lines and pores and freckles, not floodfill skin! D:

 

WHY are people so attached to these super smooth weird complexions oh my god

Dragon Age: wax museum

 

it's like when I try to look up slider sets and all I can find is uncanny-valley huge-eyed pale elf girls with enormous shiny lips

why is this appealing I don't get it

Edit to clarify: I don't have anything against huge-eyed elf girls, and looking at the slidersets reddit reveals more variation than I remembered, but there are stretches when it feels like they are The Only Thing

 

It's a lot of what I see in the nexus at least.
Not like I'm not guilty of pale-elf-girls-with-large-lips myself.

At least I don't use the drag queen eyelash mod.

 

Both of those mods gave me a visceral reaction of "NO >8U"
They don't even... look like the original characters anymore? Who are these dollpeople, plz get them away from me
And black haired Varric is just. No. Nooooooooooooo.

Also, like... for me, these dollpeople mods break immersion too much. They don't look real, especially not in a medieval fantasy world where people PROBABLY DON'T HAVE FANTASTIC HYGIENE 24/7
And if you're going to tell me that SERA, of all people, would maintain her appearance to that level, I will laugh in your face. Sera don't give a shit about looking "traditionally pretty".
(Spoiler: I love her exactly the way she is)

... wow apparently those mods upset me lol

 

And what's going on with her hair, too?

 

I suspect that modder is really in love with the blur and smudge tools in photoshop, because their mods make the characters look like all the bad late 90's digital art where people leaned heavily on blur and smudge. Bluh.

 

DDDDD:

That Varric is so uncanny valley and it's really fucking me up. That scruff just looks really fake?? And like, I think for the most part they did a really nice job with scruff in this game. But that's because you don't put HEAVY BLACK on PALE, PORELESS WAX. (Also is it just me or does the heavy contrasting stubble give him almost vampire fangs where there's bare patches under his lips?)

I tend to have most of my elves have largish eyes, because DA2 made that canon, but I tend to give them wide, thin lips with the lowest shine possible. It's not a problem if your particular elves do it (@witchknights) It's just the trend that makes me slightly exasperated. I also know for a fact that Witchknight's Lavellans are interesting, which is not something I can say for a whole lot of Lavellan OCs.

Really, the mods I want (not that I /can/ mod my DAI characters) is the ability to give them longer noses and droopier eyes.

 

None of y'alls Lavellans are a problem, there's just this trend specifically of .. alarming, cartoonish, photoshopped-looking elfgirls with like [SEXY] and [BEAUTIFUL] in the thread title, lol. Although I feel like I might be overstating it, bc now I can't find an example with which to illustrate.

 

I know I've seen what you mean. They all look like Elfquest characters - same huuuuuuuuge eyes, minuscule nose, pouty Bratz lips, and needlepoint chin.

 

dragon age
as acted out by a bunch of bratz dolls

 

@blue I don't think you are overstating at all (ftr: i just wanted a chance to show off Ren :D)

While it's slightly different, there's also a huge problem in fic (usually Cullen/Lavellan or Solavellan) where Lavellans are terribly boring and all described in ways that paint them as very boring pretty white elves. Also there's a certain section of the modding community that seems to make everyone generically pretty and a lot whiter than their original. Like Varric and Sera and reasonably white, but the mods linked about just take it to a new level. And it's SO EXASPERATING.

I need. But it needs to be a shitty Cullen/Solas mancer Lavellan.

 

I think I have a blond male bratz doll
If someone makes bratz armor...

 

This makes me want to install every mod I can find that makes characters darker-skinned and then aggressively take and post screenshots to absolutely spam the dragon age tag with.

There's one for Cass, Sera, Solas, a chasind Morrigan, and Kieran that I know of, and the Solas one re-tints a default skintone so that a bunch of npcs end up darker, too. I wonder if I could figure out how the tinting works... :|c