Ferelden In Faerun

[ArlEammon]

Ferelden is added to Toril, in an island to the West. Somehow, the climate/weather stays the same, new magic, including Templars, etcetera, even the Blight, enter the new world.

How does Ferelden fair in Faerun? Would they be a major power?

[Kaez]

I don't know much about either side... I only started playing DA:O.... but from what I gather, I think the Templars would do a massive push into Faerun to try to deal with the abhorrent Mages (imagine all the free roaming wizards/sorcs wandering around)

The blight would also try and invade places too I suppose, actually it would probably end badly for Faerun depending on which order things occur. If the Blight attacks first, I would imagine they would hold out (especially if they got some Grey Wardens) and then either the Templars would attack, which could either be good or bad, depending on how well the casters can handle magic resistant fighters, and if they see these new wizards/sorcs as a threat to themselves and humanity. Especially if they saw necros, I can only imagine how they would react. Probably similar to Blood Magic.

The outcome would probably be different though given the templars attack first (no Grey Wardens). If they managed to push through and subjugate the caster population similar to the Mages Tower in the Main Part of Faerun, and the Blight happens and Darkspawn invide, I'm gonna say their chances are less hopeful....

There is many out comes, but those two spring to mind the strongest.

[Zevox]

Hah, no. No, they would not be major players.

Seriously, just to use a short example, compare the two setting's Dragons. In both they are awe-inspiring creatures by the world's standards. In Ferelden though, even High Dragons are basically glorified giant lizards with the intelligence of a dolphin. In Faerun, ancient Dragons have physical might, magical might, and intelligence that dwarfs that of most other races.

Yeah, by D&D standards, Dragon Age is a pretty low-power setting, and the Forgotten Realms are on the higher end of D&D's standards. No comparison.

It might be funny to watch how the Chantry reacts to being thrust into a setting where the existence of many gods is verifiable, objective fact, though.

Zevox

[FoE]

You ask some strange Dragon Age-related questions sometimes, Armin. But they're novel.

I can't actually answer the question, having somehow managed to avoid reading a single Forgotten Realms book in my life. (No, wait, I did manage to finish the prologue to The Crystal Shard. Then I lost the book.)

What I will say is this: you should get a different avatar. That one you have is over-sized. I know that's supposed to be Akiro from the Conan movies, but seriously, all I can see is a portion of the background.

A fine magician you are. Go back to juggling apples!

[ArlEammon]

You ask some strange Dragon Age-related questions sometimes, Armin.

And you should get a different avatar. That one you have is over-sized. I know that's supposed to be Akiro from the Conan movies, but seriously, all I can see is a portion of the background.

A fine magician you are. Go back to juggling apples!

Ok.. Now I'm Shen Zhi Shu

[Kaez]

If you know DA:O it's easier to make comparisons. Faerun (high magic) and Ferelden (Low magic, but magic is generally forbidden outside certain areas) and those places colliding would cuase some drastic changes. As I posted above.

[Lord Raziere]

Ferelden would get bulldozed quickly.

Chantry would try to kill all the loose mages, Faerun would disagree with that, then every nation, religion and mage organization would come down on them and soundly kick their asses, leave them alone after they learned their lesson the Ferelden elves would then migrate to the new lands, finding their Faerun kin and going "OH MY GAWDS THIS IS AWESOME!" while Ferelden Dwarves would hear about Faerun Dwarves, shrug their shoulders and go back to their lives, just now hating more dwarves that are not their own dwarves.

of course then the Blight would strike Faerun, the Faerun nations would demand what the hell is happening at Ferelden, Ferelden would explain the Blight and Grey Wardens and Archdemon, then Ferelden would explain whats up with their mages, the Faerun nations would agree to make recruit Grey wardens from any adventurers interested and provide Ferelden Fade-free magical spellcasting or the Faerun mages would suddenly find out the Fade exists and demons would try to possess their bodies, either way magic is changed and the Blight is defeated.

so not much would change.

[Mikeavelli]

The plotline power of magic is generally more powerful than the mechanical power of magic in Ferelden, and there are plenty of storyline equivalencies.

Blasting is the specialty of the Player Characters, but doesn't seem to be a terribly popular form of magic storylinewise. Most of the really powerful stuff involves summoning or binding spirits from the Fade.

You've got a 10 year old becomming an Abomination, and suddenly summoning enough undead to make a mid to high level Necromancer in D&D proud.

Pretty much everyone with the capability for magic can Astrally Project in Ferelden (Entering the Fade), but the equivalent of the Gate or Plane Shift spells (Physically entering the Fade) took half the Lyrium in Tevinter and a good amount of Blood magic on top of it.

Mages in Faerun are hampered by their need to rest for 8 straight hours to recover their spells, while Ferelden Mages can operate pretty much indefinitely with only a few minutes of downtime between battles. This is both a gameplay mechanic and a fluff thing, but fluff implies the need for a fair amount of Lyrium to be involved.

Ferelden is highly militarized to deal with the occasional Blights and constant warfare, and their best warriors have class levels to go toe to toe with the best Faerun has to offer. I'd say they could stand on equal footing with Faerunian physical armies.

Overall I'd say they could hold their own, and might even become an important power block, but if they tried to take on the rest of FAerun at once in some mad anti-wizard crusade, they'd fail pretty horribly.

I can't see the Darkspawn being any more dangerous than the hundred other evil armies that regularly threaten the peoples of Faerun.

[Lord Raziere]

yea, the Blight for Ferelden is near world-ending.

for Faerun, its just another threat for some random band of mid-level adventurers to solve from time to time, if five random guys can beat eldritch abominations, demons and devils the abyss and the hells, evil gods on top of the various barbaric hordes of monsters, whatever decides to crawl up from the underdark and the elemental lord guys plus whatever epic level wizard decides to go evil,plus dragonslaying, I think they can handle fighting more barbarian hordes and slightly different dragonslaying.

[Innis Cabal]

Your forgetting there's a God controling all the magic in Toril. The fade isn't going to mean much when compared to Mystra and the Weave. And there are spells to protect against demons.

The other issue here is. There are Gods. Real Gods. Spells like Wish, Epic level casters that can summon suns....nothing in Dragon Age can compet with that.

[Mikeavelli]

Honestly, the Blight was only a world-ending event back for the first one, when it had a truly immortal dragon-leader-god-thing. This most recent one was indeed stopped by a ragtag band of misfits and their little dog too.

Faerun has casters capable of Hax and tippyverse shennanigans, but for the most part they don't engage in such shenanigans!

Yes, everything has a counter, my point is that Ferelden could hold its own in Faerun, not that they'd dominate or anything.

[Fan]

Faerun has Elminster.

That is all you need to know.

Seriously though, DnD Power Levels vastly out scale those of Dragon Age. In a V.S. Argument, Tippyverse Shenangins are very real, and very present.

Hell, if it really came down to it, (provided this is Pre Spell Plague.) we have Mystra herself, a Physical God of Magic who is powerful enough that her death warps the magic of the world in ways that make me cringe, and is in command of pretty much most magic.

[Mikeavelli]

You cannot possibly have forgotten the original post already;

Ferelden is added to Toril, in an island to the West. Somehow, the climate/weather stays the same, new magic, including Templars, etcetera, even the Blight, enter the new world.

How does Ferelden fair in Faerun? Would they be a major power?

Emphasis mine.
This isn't a VS thread.

[Eldan]

The problem is that in Faerun, casters actually did start Tippyverse-esque shenanigans in the past. Not quite full-blown Tippy, but flying cities, divine avatars, leveling mountains and hordes of monsters.

And yes, Elminster and Drizzt. I'd trust either of them to Solo Ferelden, compared to what they have done in the past.

[Anteros]

The problem is that in Faerun, casters actually did start Tippyverse-esque shenanigans in the past. Not quite full-blown Tippy, but flying cities, divine avatars, leveling mountains and hordes of monsters.

And yes, Elminster and Drizzt. I'd trust either of them to Solo Ferelden, compared to what they have done in the past.

I don't really think Drizzt is any more powerful than the Warden protagonist from Dragon Age honestly. Actually, I think my L35 rogue would hand Drizzt his behind on a platter. Unless of course they're engaging in an emo-poetry contest...in which case Drizzt would dominate everyone.

[Eldan]

I have only read one or two Drizzt books (they weren't all that good, really), but it seems he can Solo demons and giants, at least. He's still a bad protagonist, but pretty strong, at least in plot power.

[Anteros]

I have only read one or two Drizzt books (they weren't all that good, really), but it seems he can Solo demons and giants, at least. He's still a bad protagonist, but pretty strong, at least in plot power.

I'm not saying that he's weak...but I don't think he does anything that the Warden from Dragon Age couldn't accomplish. I don't think the power difference here is as wide as some are implying. The problem is that magic in dnd is so much more versatile than it is in DA:O. However, if you look at the fluff instead of the game mechanics, magic in Ferelden may be every bit as powerful.

I doubt that they would have any answer for Elminster though.

[JabberwockySupafly]

I haven't played through all of DA:O myself, but the magic in the setting compared to Toril is rather less than impressive. I also haven't really read a lot of FR books in a long time, but from what I remember, isn't Elven High Magic pretty much the high fantasy equivilant to a superweapon? I mean, seriously, they have a spell called Sunder which can split a world in half. I don't feel Ferelden would fare well if they magically appeared on Toril one day.

The minute the Chantry start trying to "rein in" all of the 'casters wandering around the realms (especially with the way Elves are treated in Ferelden, from what I remember), the entirety of Ferelden would be reduced to a smouldering wasteland devoid of life, except for tumbleweeds. I mean, dramatic flare can survive anything.

[Anteros]

We need to remember that this is not a Vs. thread.

Why would the Chantry even want to police a group of mages who don't use the fade? The Chantry/Templars are worried about mages being possessed by fade demons. They would likely leave mages who don't use the fade alone.

[JabberwockySupafly]

We need to remember that this is not a Vs. thread.

Why would the Chantry even want to police a group of mages who don't use the fade? The Chantry/Templars are worried about mages being possessed by fade demons. They would likely leave mages who don't use the fade alone.

See, then this poses a problem. How can the Fade exist in a world with an already established source of magic, ie the Weave/Shadow Weave? I can't see Mystra (if we're going 3rd & back) or Shar (4th) allowing an independent source of magic that they can't control suddenly cropping up. One would have to consume the other, which means one of two things would occur:


The Fade vanishes, and the mages of Ferelden learn to use Toril's source of magic and thus the Chantry no longer have the level of control they once had and are at best redundant, or at worst turned into piles of goo by a fair few angry mages whose friends have been magically lobotomised;

or the Weave gets sucked into the Fade, and Elminster's suddenly gotten a hankering for baby, and the Chantry are completely overwhelmed by an insatiable horde of demon-possessed mages.

All I'm trying to say is, no matter how you look at this, if you're trying to focus on the two worlds meshing, it doesn't end well for Ferelden. Sticking a relatively LoMag setting into a place where Epic Stuff happens so often your average commoner can remark "Oh look. There's an army of dragons heading towards town. Again." isn't very cohesive.

I wasn't trying to make it sound like I was doing a "VS" between the two, as I said, I simply don't see the two realms fitting very well due to the drastic differences, and the blatant racism that Elves, one of the primary powers of Toril, face in Ferelden (hence the wasteland remark). So, I apologise if I sounded like I was saying "Drizzt ftw lulz." I actually like DA:O over FR hands down story and setting wise. FR has far too much cheese in it and the setting has gotten downright silly over the years.

[VanBuren]

How would the rest of Thedas react to a huge chunk of land disappearing? Would Orlais, upon their punching bag vanishing, reveal that they really did care all along?

[Innis Cabal]

The Fade vanishes, and the mages of Ferelden learn to use Toril's source of magic and thus the Chantry no longer have the level of control they once had and are at best redundant, or at worst turned into piles of goo by a fair few angry mages whose friends have been magically lobotomised;

How can they cut people off from the Weave. Only Mystra can do that. The chantry would be done for.

or the Weave gets sucked into the Fade, and Elminster's suddenly gotten a hankering for baby, and the Chantry are completely overwhelmed by an insatiable horde of demon-possessed mages.

Considering we're not ripping the world out, just Fereldan, the Fade wouldn't come with it. They're not being meshed. They're being phased into another world. Not to mention there are actually God's on this side, and one of whom has full power over it. Chances of The Fade...nil. Even if it did come over in the transfer. And if it did, and somehow didn't get oblitereated by Mystra, Shar or even Ao...why use it when there is a -VASTLY- more powerful and WAY less damaging way to do the same thing (and more).

[The Glyphstone]

How can they cut people off from the Weave. Only Mystra can do that. The chantry would be done for.

I think that's what he meant. The chantry can't cut people off from the Weave the way they could destroy people's ability to tap the Fade, so they get overrun and obliterated by a horde of angry mages looking to avenge their lobotomized friends from before the crossover happened.

[Jeivar]

I actually would really like to see this happen so I could see the Templars get knocked down by fifteen pegs when they try to get uppity with D&D magic users as a whole. Yeah they don't use the Fade, but the Templars are lyrium-addicted, fanatical, paranoid bastards with a history of killing mages on mere suspicion, so I don't think they'd stop to examine the situation closely before falling on their instincts. And would their magic-draining powers even work on D&D mages? It certainly wouldn't against divine spellcasters.

Also I'd love to see Ferelden hicks try to bully Faerun elves. Especially "them funny lookin' ones with the black skin and white hair". It'd be comedy gold, methinks.

Aside from that I don't think Ferelden could become a serious power. The army consists of completely normal conscripts used to fighting completely normal wars. Imagine them meeting an orc horde with a few trolls and giants on their payroll. Not to mention the wast social upheaval and chaos when the Fereldans realized just how fundamentally different this new world is.
And the Templars wouldn't be able to launch a Holy Exalted March since they wouldn't be able to call on their brethren in other lands. And without any real military power to back it up, a church without a visible god or holy powers would be laughed at by the world at large. (I kind of feel bad for Leliana)
Heck, I think an ancient dragon could take the place over, if it started by making a quick, strong attack on the mage tower.

[Lord Raziere]

I actually would really like to see this happen so I could see the Templars get knocked down by fifteen pegs when they try to get uppity with D&D magic users as a whole. Yeah they don't use the Fade, but the Templars are lyrium-addicted, fanatical, paranoid bastards with a history of killing mages on mere suspicion, so I don't think they'd stop to examine the situation closely before falling on their instincts. And would their magic-draining powers even work on D&D mages? It certainly wouldn't against divine spellcasters.

Also I'd love to see Ferelden hicks try to bully Faerun elves. Especially "them funny lookin' ones with the black skin and white hair". It'd be comedy gold, methinks.

Aside from that I don't think Ferelden could become a serious power. The army consists of completely normal conscripts used to fighting completely normal wars. Imagine them meeting an orc horde with a few trolls and giants on their payroll. Not to mention the wast social upheaval and chaos when the Fereldans realized just how fundamentally different this new world is.
And the Templars wouldn't be able to launch a Holy Exalted March since they wouldn't be able to call on their brethren in other lands. And without any real military power to back it up, a church without a visible god or holy powers would be laughed at by the world at large. (I kind of feel bad for Leliana)
Heck, I think an ancient dragon could take the place over, if it started by making a quick, strong attack on the mage tower.

an ancient dragon almost did in the first game, only reason it didn't? Plot. That is right, there is no reason for Ferelden to have survived the Blight except for the fact doing so makes it a fun game.

[VanBuren]

an ancient dragon almost did in the first game, only reason it didn't? Plot. That is right, there is no reason for Ferelden to have survived the Blight except for the fact doing so makes it a fun game.

Odd. In my game, it was because I thoroughly kicked its ass.

[Jeivar]

an ancient dragon almost did in the first game

And a D&D ancient is much more powerful, what with being highly magical and, y'know, one of the smartest beings in existence. So it would almost certainly steamroll Ferelden in short time.

[Eldan]

I'm not sure about the "Orc army with Trolls in it" bit, that's basically what Darkspawn already are, and Ferelden seems to be able to handle that. Their problem are any variety of evil high magic factions potentially trying to take over.
Red Wizards hiring circle mages? Drow expanding into the tunnel systems under Ferelden? Mind Flayers?

[hamishspence]

In 4E era, another two factions, which were once exceptionally high-magic empires, have rebuilt quite a bit- the Shadovar (ancient Netheril) and the Imaskari.

Then there's the aboleths- an ancient faction of which have returned to Eberron in their flying city, with hordes of now flight-capable aberrations- including krakens.

So, there's some seriously high-magic guys out there.