except for cullen, solas and sera, everybody got the short stick in the romance content in trespasser. >:| why cant my enormous lady adaar secretly marry josie too.
Ok here is the thing about the Solasmance. Maybe it's just that I am in the middle of it and have also not played in a while but. He and the Inquisitor, sure they love each other if you're playing it that way but I have a hard time thinking of if they LIKE each other, if that makes sense. Like, I have a hard time thinking of... what they do that they enjoy doing together? Just, normal fondness stuff. And maybe that's just an issue with me as a roleplayer. Ugh I'm having a hard time word-ing.
I get what you mean. My particular solasmance pt is... i headcanon it as a very complicated, slightly unhealthy relationship even if you ignore solas's whole shtick, and i don't think solas in inquisition is the type to do fondness, if it makes sense?
That makes me so sad because the people I can't stand got the better side of things. Noooo. NOOOOOOOOO. what did i do to deserve this bioware. was it my complaining about krogans lacking quads in fanart. was it that. Well no Cullen is ok but that's kind of it. He is just. Ok.
Hey, Sera is fantastic and I won't hear a word against her. :P tbh I don't feel like the Solas romance got all that much additional content over a friendship, even in Trespasser. I mean, so far my main Inq's friendship/unrequited crush/seeing him as a mentor feels deeper than my solasmancer Inq's actual romantic relationship with him. Then again, I'm still pre-HLTA and WEWH in her playthrough, so - shrug?
I hear nice things about her romance and getting to know her, but something about her just is very grating to me. It might get better over time though. Maybe. God I hope so. I do not hope so with Solas though. I will go on hating that man till the end of time. I may come to respect him as time goes on but I will despise him. My hatred will last to the end of time. It may even outdo my hatred for Tavros and boy howdy does Tavros get me flared up. Aon<3<The Egg otp. Also it's mostly just dramatic whining on my part. I am a bit actually grumpy about it but I will live. I can write my shitty fanfics or something after all.
I think Solas's isn't so much actual content as emotional impact, especially for the people who did him first.
*snickers like a 12 year old* ANYway - Another reason I wish he wasn't female-only - even though my main was my second Inq he had a connection with Solas my first Inq didn't, and in such a way a romance would have been perfect. Making an Inq specifically to romance him just... doesn't have that connection, even though I've grown really fond of that Inq. Ah well. What with my main having romanced Dorian and having had an unrequited thing for Solas, he's had a really good story full of delicious tragedy. :D
my main inq is a mage, and I was gonna romance Solas until a) Cullen ran away from the flirting b) Solas did like Solas does and I got a strong snob teacher impression of him. Now I'm romancing him with her disaster of a sister and at least in my headcanons it's been pretty interesting. Nellas is intensely Elfy and basically a Dalish isolationist - the Lavellans have too much contact with humans for her taste, and she only stays with the clan because she loves Idrilla more than anything, and that's why she goes to the Conclave with her and Oindys, my other Lavellan who's supposed to be a warrior but i hate playing warriors. Anyway. in Nellas-as-Inquisitor Idrilla dies at the explosion, which really breaks Nellas a little, and she gets really attached to Solas because Nellas resented so much that she wasn't a mage like her sister that she latched tooth and nail to whatever bit of anything magical she could get in close proximity to, even back at the clan - she used to do really dangerous stuff while looking for magical artifacts in ruins because she is desperate to be closer to magic, she wants to make it part of herself. The two used to be super strongly close until Idrilla's magic manifested and their paths started separating, and she hates that. Idrilla got so much praise and respect as a Mage, and Nellas... sort of feels she is less of a True Elf because True Elves were magical and Dalish mages would be the closer to the ancient ideal of Arlathan than people like her, who are ordinary and nonmagical. so she feels a little incomplete, a little left out... Solas's tales of a world without the Veil, a world where everyone and everything is magic are almost like a trap for her, really. She gets progressively More Done and Angrier and More Tired during Inquisition, and slowly makes everyone hate her and leave until Solas is the only one she has left, and then he dumps her, a point where she basically flips off the world. She is a terrible leader and hates dealing with anything and makes all the bad decisions because she never thinks anything through and never considers the consequences of her actions so I made her get her clan murdered, and it's a giant dramafest. In Idrilla's pt, though, she stays behind at camp with Oindys and later becomes an Inquisition agent out of love for her sister and a desire to protect her from the evil Shems and still ends up falling for Solas and he knows it, but I'm thinking it would be nice if after she joins the Inquisition their relationship falls apart because... Idrilla is a lot better as an Inquisitor. Her views are a lot more moderate and she's just Better at dealing with everything, Idrilla doesn't need her protection and ignores her advice and takes her for granted and she doesn't understand Nellas, not anymore, not like she did when they were children - I have a bit of fic written where Idrilla describes her sister as "simple" and "single-minded" and other quite frankly kinda rude adjectives that are a fundamental misunderstanding of Nellas's character. And when Nellas realizes Idrilla is quite happy living with the Shems, that she's fucking a Shem, that she doesn't want to go back to the clan and to their family and to the life Nellas considered almost ideal, she gets really, really angry. The rest of her clan not so much because they understand what Idrilla's doing even if they don't approve of some (coughCullencough), which makes her even more furious, and then... I'm almost sure she would become an agent of Fen'Harel during Trespasser and disappear to do whatever Veil-shattering thing Solas wants to do. wow this was supposed to be just a couple of lines
Wow she is even bitchier than Saoirse. Though maybe Saoirse's bitchiness is also just different. Saoirse's the sort of person who will put on a good face not because she likes you or really cares but more because she's did the numbers and, yeap, you're useful to her plans. Anyway. Wow that bitchy elf. I like this.
:") thanks guys i'm so invested in my trash children i could talk about them for hours lmao i should work to put it all on fic decent enough for others to read but my writing's terrible.
I'm so bad at making backstories for my quizzies DX My first quizzie was basically me if I was a buff Qunari Tal-Vashoth mage, my second was a badass dwarf lady who was nice but also ruthless if you got in her way, and my most developed quizzie isn't even in my game, I just write her in fic. Kudos to people who put that much effort into their OCs bc I am the worst at it.
For me I honestly don't put much effort in at the start. I just go "I wanna be an elf and this class and yeap that hair looks good" with a side of "I want to be ENTER SEXUALITY HERE". Everything else then just kind of happens. So Saoirse just kind of rolled into being a two-faced story and culture obsessed twit who is totally not based on Aranea what are you talking about. Fionn, my Hawke, is like that too. He just kind of happened. Though I did make the decision to make him a sarcastic shit in honor of the first Fionn I made. Namely, Fionn was a shrimpy little shit of an elf tower mage in Origins. He was tiny and gay and very angry at the establishment. Him and Fionn Hawke are very different people though. Hawke was much less angry. Or at least his anger wasn't so bombastic and small doggish as Fionn's was. Like I don't think Fionn could coldly kill some out of revenge but Hawke could. At the same time Fionn couldn't have kept his cool to let Anders stay to help after fucking everything up. Granted Fionn would be right alongside Anders realistically. But assuming Anders did something capable of pushing Fionn into the realm of "I am so fucking done with you" on the scale of DA2's ending he would not have let him stick around. Fionn is not the warden we need or deserve.
My main Inq didn't start with a backstory - hell, he wasn't supposed to be more than a casual playthrough to see Dorian's romance. I gave him a good face, a pretty but honestly kind of silly name, and an interesting attitude that would force me to play differently than I do by default, and away I went. By the time I got to In Hushed Whispers I was buried in headcanons. Roleplaying his attitude really strictly was what did it. I default to kind of bland diplomacy otherwise, but playing an elven mage who is a capricious flirt, argumentative, prone to making big decisions in fits of pique, and doesn't want to be tied down - is honestly kind of afraid of having too much responsibility, in fact - made for a really interesting playthrough full of questionable decisions. It gave Embriel instant backstory - being prone to fits of pique and shying away from responsibility are really bad traits for a clan's First, so I decided that his Keeper got sick of his bullshit and decided that if she was going to risk any of the clan, it would be her pain in the ass apprentice who didn't even really believe in the Creators and caused a big argument at the gathering of all the clans about how the Dalish needed to stop living so much in the past (when he wasn't off banging another clan's Keeper, Mythal have mercy). Let him have only responsibility over himself, sending messages back, and a head-first dunk into shem society. Maybe he'd grow up a little. Then Embriel has responsibility forced upon him - LOTS of responsibility - and while at first he says he's glad to be away from his clan and elfiness (because he would be), it's overwhelming, especially as a figurehead for a human organization who ends up defending the Dalish as often as not. A pox on all the supposed gods, he thinks, and he's prepared to blow that joint as soon as he can, but then In Hushed Whispers happens and seeing Leliana's fevor and sacrifice rattles him deeply. He starts really feeling a sense of responsibility for once, and that's overwhelming. He ends up kind of emotionally clinging to Solas, despite Solas's disdain for any Dalish, because from Embriel's pov Solas is wary and lonely, just like he is (but won't admit to), and he is smart and skilled and another mage, who is willing to talk to him about magic stuff, and Embriel really, really appreciates that. And, since he already has kind of a Thing for older guys, one hell of a crush ensues. Meanwhile he's flirting with Dorian (a thing that is honestly hard to justify with an elf) because 1. Dorian is hot 2. it's scandalous - he's not only Tevinter, but a human, and while he's dallied with human men before he's now a figurehead for the goddamn Chantry, this is really going to twist their undies into a knot. He also happens to be the only other person who experienced what Embriel went through with the time travel stuff, and while he was at more of an emotional remove there's a bond there. Embriel has underlying respect for him after that, enough so that when they clash over Dorian's 'Slavery's not so bad, you have alienages' bullshit, Embriel thinks it's actually worth arguing with him and trying to change his mind. After Embriel is made Inquisitor, Dorian's one of the people who consistently shows him respect, doesn't try to hide things from him, and generally treats him like a person. He's smart, he's kinder than his persona leads a lot of people to believe, and he's got a big personality hiding character flaws and a lot of pain - Embriel relates to that. He urges Dorian to reconcile with his father because he remembers how he left his clan and knows how leaving that separation a big, open wound makes it hurt and fester more. ... See? It totally gets away from me! All based on one line of personality description (and with a little assist from how the male British VA delivers his lines).
It's funny, because going the bland diplomatic route is actually sort of what built Heliose up as a character for me. I'd made him to romance Cass, and most of the mage-y dialogues with her in the beginning have to be very consolatory to get any positive approval, so he started off being polite and diplomatic and biting the absolute hell out of his tongue every time someone shat on the elves-- aaaaaand then Dorian happened and it was too late, he was chasing that sweet, sweet Tevinter tail. So a decision originally made to appeal to Cass (conscripting the mages) becomes something that's instead a reflection of how grimly responsible Heloise is. He ended up conscripting the Wardens as well, simply because if these people were going to work with him, they were going to work for him; it was his duty to both take care of them and take responsibility for their mistakes, because in a lot of ways he took the tear in the Veil onto his shoulders waaaay more than he should have. I think the only time he abdicated responsibility (in his mind) was with the Well, and that was almost 100% influenced by both Dorian and Solas going, "Hey, maybe don't???" (Which, on a slight tangent: doing the Well with a mage inquis and two mages in the party makes it fucking hilarious to listen to them bicker. With Heliose, Solas, and Morrigan all bickering about the Dalish gods and lore and Dorian and Solas sniping over their respective magic, it was a good time had by all.) Which sort of made Trespasser even more powerful for me? Because this was a character that had, at every turn, done his best to mitigate the sheer amount of damage the Inquisition was going to have-- and he got betrayed from the inside. I really like how you can just build up rage throughout the entirety of the DLC, and between Hakkon (which in my canon took place after Corephytits got his ass killed) and this shit, Heliose was done. He was so done. He was doneion rings. He had never been more done in his life. I wish we'd gotten a scene where you were able to tell the Divine what you were planning on doing, but even without it, I figure he made sure to tell Viv. After all, it's one of her sources of power he's pulling, even if that source of power has always been him, and he respected her enough that he would have told her before announcing to everyone. A public scandal (he didn't even tell the Divine he was going to do that!!!) was pretty much exactly what they would both need to carefully distance themselves from the issue-- she couldn't have known, and he clearly hates her now, so they're definitely not still sending notes back and forth, nope. I'm pretty excited to see where starting with rude and angry responses instead of diplomatic and apologetic ones takes me. I'm geared up to woo the shit out of Jose, so I wanna do someone who's a headache and a half for her.
Idrilla also got her start because of the bland diplomacy and got built up from there as i played/replayed her and started building the other characters, like her sister and the rest of the Lavellans. She was the first character I created for the game on like, the moment of the release, so I didn't know anything about the story. I only knew I wanted her to be very #magepride, like Liesyn and Simon/one-of-the-instances-of-Garnet Hawke, so that ruled out dwarves; I really don't care for human nobles, so there goes Trevelyan, and between elves and Qunari, elves had the most romances (so i could pick anyone i liked without going noooo i don't wanna settle for someone because bae is racelocked), so I chose elf, and decided i would pick all elfy options because where's the fun otherwise? Because I chose bland diplomacy whenever the option to be elfy didn't show on major 'story' dialogue, I started to headcanon her as someone who took an effort to be nice whenever she wasn't overwhelmed, and that sort of... developed into someone who trained to be diplomatic. I would flirt all the flirts available (so hello bisexual), and sometimes I'd pick the funny options in character dialogue, sort of the opposite i did with my hawkes (who were purple on the outside, blue inside). It makes sense for Firsts and Keepers to be diplomatic, because I'm guessing they're the conflict solvers between people in their clans and between clans, and since the Lavellans care about human affairs at all it probably meant she had a fair share of contact with humans by, say, going to the cities with the traders to keep an eye on them and smooth thins over in case of conflict. The excess of knowledge of chantry affairs on dialogue was headcanoned in this as well - she had to learn about human culture to deal with humans - which sort of became a curiosity in general, and if she took the time to study chantry culture to better deal with merchants and guards and chantry people on behalf of her clan, she must be someone who takes her responsibilities seriously. And i took for eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeever to start Cullen's romance because i was really digging the awkward pinning, and I translated this as her denying her feelings in the face of responsibility/their differences, and that... became someone who follows her head more than her heart and who sort of hides behind this polite wall of what's nice and civil and ends up appearing to be somewhat cold, and slowly defrosting as she gets to know people. And then, like, someone who gets really nurturing/supportive as time goes on and is probably very motherly in her clan because some of the friendship dialogue is seriously heartwarming, and then I explained that as her having a bunch of younger siblings she took care of... stuff like that. By Trespasser I'd stuck somewhere that she's the sort of person that likes having things under her control and is a bit of an workaholic (so many sidequests that realistically would be someone elses problem, and she and Cullen are terrible, hilarious busybees), and Trespasser is really aggravating to her because of it. and she's angry and afraid of death and the "can one thing in this world stay fucking fixed) is the closest to Truly Done, I Am Having A Breakdown she is. Because she put a lot of effort and emotional investment into doing the things in a way that made the world a better place in the end, she had given up her clan and even if she had found her happiness it wasn't easy, and as she says no one is satisfied with what she's done. They're all trying to take from her the control of what she built because she was only good to do the hard things no one wanted to, apparently? she's feeling used rather than trusted and it doesnt sit right with her. (my personal timeline for her including the dlcs is all over the place and not canon, because she and cullen start the romance after Ameridan's 'take happiness wherever you can find it, the world will take the rest' bit makes Idrilla think and get the nerves to make their flirting/pining something substancial and Jaws of Hakkon happens when they're still investigating where the hell coryphishit is before the temple of mythal. but i still want them dancing at halamshiral as Totally Just Friends Really) Nellas was created because these attitudes had become so much her that I wanted an Anti-Idrilla of sorts, and I wanted to romance Solas, so I created Nellas to be Idrilla's older twin and the mess she is now.
OH and because i'm astrology trash, Idrilla takes more after the positive expressions of Virgo, while Nellas takes after the negative expressions.
Berit started out as a way to explain my Bland Diplomacy tendencies too! like, most of her early choices came from me picking the options that were easy for me to pick and then back-explaining her politeness into a veneer over a deep well of freaking out. :D Man, a lot of people in this thread have talked about how glad they were to have their Inquisitors get MAD during Trespasser - me included. I'm so glad they put that in. :D
I need to re-do Trespasser with Embriel because the angry option during That Scene was really underwhelming with the British male VA - it was kind of half-hearted. Which isn't inappropriate, Embriel was falling to pieces emotionally, buuuuut I think one of the other dialogue options will probably work better. (That, and the goodbye conversation before Davaarad didn't trigger for me and I'd actually like to experience it...)
