Dragon Age 2: The Order Dictates

[Honest Tiefling]

Spirit Possession! Now 100% Demon-Free. Side effects may include: Hatred of dogs, unexpected tender speech, inappropriate behavior, kitten-obsession, voice changes, depression, increased desire for lovin', glowing blue acne, increased ability to heal, desire to wear pants, and inability to imbibe alcohol.

Remember: If it ain't Spirit Possession, you're probably just a walking husk for a demon. Sorry.

[VanBuren]

This.

I loved Anders in Awakenings. I also liked Justice in Awakenings. It only seems odd that combining two likeable characters results in such an annoying, insane, jerkish and idiotic character.

There's those codex entries about the--- wossname-- the ones that keep talking about Kirkwall and the Tevinter experiments. Basically the implication by the time you find them all is that the boundary to the Fade is paperthin in Kirkwall, and it's one of the reasons you find a blood mage around every corner. So there's a popular theory that whatever problem existed in the merge only became exaggerated.

On a related note, I can't decide on a name for it. JusticeAnders? Janders? Or maybe I should focus on Justice's corrupted nature. VengeAnders?

[Giggling Ghast]

The notes in question were left by the Band of Three.

And I like Janders, myself.

[Delusion]

Avenger? ^^

[Dienekes]

On Anders

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I personally never liked the guy. But this is largely because I like Aveline and he is an utter jackass to her. A completely disrespectful git who deserved to be punched in the face.
I haven't played Awakening, admittedly, and Anders comes off as an original character in this game, but not a particularly interesting one.

[VanBuren]

On Anders

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I personally never liked the guy. But this is largely because I like Aveline and he is an utter jackass to her. A completely disrespectful git who deserved to be punched in the face.
I haven't played Awakening, admittedly, and Anders comes off as an original character in this game, but not a particularly interesting one.

He's far more affable in his original appearance. In that one, his anti-Templar crusade essentially amounts to escaping from the Circle, peacefully submitting to the Templars when they catch him, then escaping again sometime later. Can't remember how many times he'd repeated the cycle by the game's beginning.

...but Justice uses the party banter to try and convince Anders that it's selfish of him to look after himself and not look out for his fellow mages. According to the backstory, Justice eventually convinces Anders and they merge, but the hate Anders has developed for them twists Justice into Vengeance. And of course, it's implied through the Band of Three notes, that the thin wall to the Fade is just making things worse there.

[Giggling Ghast]

He escaped from the Circle seven times. The last time he escaped, they put him in solitary confinement for a year.

The one issue I have with Anders in DA2 is that he doesn't seem to approve of helping the helpless (though he still does aid people through his clinic). Anders in Awakening lost approval if you expressed an opinion other than "da Chantry sucks, yo", but you could also win approval from him through Good acts. He doesn't seem to care as much about that.

[Honest Tiefling]

You got as much disapproval from the guy for refusing his very blatant advances after...

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...You found his friend who had been basically mindraped, who then begged for death forcing Anders to kill him...

...As you did turning mages over to the Templar.

As for Aveline...

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In one of those lines your partymates have while you are walking about, he'll ask if Aveline ever played Naughty Apostate/Dirty Templar or similar games with her husband who died a year ago. And Wesley had actually accepted the help of an apostate. This is one of the examples of Anders seeming to lack compassion that really made me confused about if he was supposed to be a jerk or a compassionate guy.

[Giggling Ghast]

To be fair to Anders, the player controls when the next time they talk, and he flirts only if the player is particularly nice to him.

[Honest Tiefling]

It is quite annoying when you want to build friendship with the guy but then he whips out the whole 'Love me or I won't like you!' thing. And I really dislike it when people mistake kindness for a come on, and act like you're just being a big ol' tease for doing things like rescuing his friend? If that is flirting, then my Hawke seems to have flirted with half of Kirkwall.

[BladeofOblivion]

It is quite annoying when you want to build friendship with the guy but then he whips out the whole 'Love me or I won't like you!' thing. And I really dislike it when people mistake kindness for a come on, and act like you're just being a big ol' tease for doing things like rescuing his friend? If that is flirting, then my Hawke seems to have flirted with half of Kirkwall.

At the very least, it makes more sense than Rivalry Flirtations.




Fenris: WHAT?! You killed an army of templars, fed them to blood mages, ate children and then gave their blood to more blood mages to help their blood magic do blood magic?!

Hawke: Yes.

Fenris: I love you.

[Zevox]

You got as much disapproval from the guy for refusing his very blatant advances after...

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...You found his friend who had been basically mindraped, who then begged for death forcing Anders to kill him...

...As you did turning mages over to the Templar.

You know, I've heard of that, but in three play throughs of the game I've never actually had it happen. Weird considering how many people seem to have experienced it.

Anyway, on Anders - I don't know, that's one where I sometimes think I played a different game than everyone else. Aside from his weird paranoia about Aveline and the guards, he never struck me as jerkish at all, just dedicated to his cause - and considering what that cause is, that's something I admire and like about him. I do think he lost too much of his sense of humor from Awakening for my taste personally, but in retrospect I think that's just the nature of his character development. And hell, even though I disagree with his final actions, I can fully understand and sympathize with why he did it, and he obviously completely understood what he was doing and what it would mean and was fully rational about it, so I can't help but scratch my head a statements indicating he was crazy or something there.

In other news, we're at the 50 page mark now, so we're going to need a second thread soon. Name ideas anyone?

Guess I'll just throw out the obvious, given even though it isn't a line in the game, it's single most common quote in this thread: "Dragon Age 2-2: Dammit, Anders!"

Zevox

[Edge]

In other news, we're at the 50 page mark now, so we're going to need a second thread soon. Name ideas anyone?

• "I thought that might interest you."
• "Serah, there are blood mages in the caverns again."
• Bloody visuals make blood mages OP
• "I thought maybe your beard had fallen onto your chest."

All I have for now.

[Honest Tiefling]

Quick comments before we do! And I guess we could call it 'We liked Anders better when he had a cat', but that's probably not witty enough. Not my strong point. We could try a different word for cat, but that won't go so well, I think. I guess 'I want to be a dragon' is also out of the question.

To get Anders upset for turning him down, you have to talk to him during Act I, before the Deep Roads Expedition, after you do his quest. I picked mostly nice answers when speaking to people, with the occasional purple and no red ones, so I was definitely playing a nicer Lady Hawke. Someone said that also influences if he hits on you, but I think you also need to pick the right answers and try to calm him down and reassure him.

There are other segments, in Act II and Act III...

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...With Fenris/Tevintar. Love Fenris or hate him, I think the game made it clear that what happened to Fenris was pretty awful, and the fact that he often faced betrayal before (And after, according to the wiki) because of Danarius probably took a toll on the dude.

So I don't really get where Anders has the right to tell Fenris that he doesn't have the disposition to be a slave. Um...What? What the heck, Anders, what the heck. I might be socially inept, but I don't think this is how you go about things. Even if you are opposed to the guy, I don't really think that was cool.

So you wind up with a really odd situation where Anders is squeeing over a Tevintar Chantry amulet, when you have/can clear out an entire dungeon of slaves killed and made into undead by Tevintar mages. I put Orana in my house, so I imagine she could have also informed Anders that Tevintar are not nice people. Or you know, look at the piles of bodies they killed for blood magic. Or look at all of those people buying slaves.

I think that Tevintar was either supposed to be ambiguous, or shown as really awesome to mages who get the short end of the stick elsewhere. I am really confused why these mages keep thinking Tevintar is a nice place. I wonder if the story went into a different direction with Tevintar or something. Or if Fenriyel is not such a nice dude...

I would have liked Anders a lot more if his jerkiness was explained a bit better. Even House has some explanation for what he does, and you get the definite feeling he's supposed to be that way. Anders seems like the story pretends he's a nice guy, but then he goes and does the oddest things.

[Zevox]

To get Anders upset for turning him down, you have to talk to him during Act I, before the Deep Roads Expedition, after you do his quest.

I've always done that, but still never had him come on to me. (I'd reply to more, but I need to be off to my job shortly.)

Zevox

[VanBuren]

"In memory of Ser-Pounce-A-Lot"

"It's friend-fiction, out of love"

"Dragon Age II: Just add three goats, and a sheaf of wheat"

"We're babbling again"

"Like pastries to a Varric"

"Stop fondling Andraste!"

"Find your own urchin!"

In honor of the fact that the Arishok is a hipster, my personal favorite: "The Qun is pretty deep. You wouldn't get it."

[Honest Tiefling]

...Does that mean Qunari are what happen when hipsters go militant? I better do something about that expensive burger place that sells pabst blue ribbon near my house...

And please tell me I am not the only one who wanted to romance Flemeth and make that the new title.

[Zevox]

"It's friend-fiction, out of love"

I totally vote for that one. (Though it should be "I do it out of love.")

"Serah, there are blood mages in the caverns again."
"Dragon Age II: Just add three goats, and a sheaf of wheat"
"Stop fondling Andraste!"

These are good too however.

Zevox

[Thormag]

In honor of the fact that the Arishok is a hipster, my personal favorite: "The Qun is pretty deep. You wouldn't get it."

Dorian approves +50

[Edge]

Hipster Qun gets my vote.

[Douglas]

I've always done that, but still never had him come on to me. (I'd reply to more, but I need to be off to my job shortly.)

Zevox

Was it inside his clinic in Darktown?

[Giggling Ghast]

Was it inside his clinic in Darktown?

Yes, it's the first convo you have with him after the Tranquility quest.

New thread here.

[Dienekes]

Anyway, on Anders - I don't know, that's one where I sometimes think I played a different game than everyone else. Aside from his weird paranoia about Aveline and the guards, he never struck me as jerkish at all, just dedicated to his cause - and considering what that cause is, that's something I admire and like about him.

I don't know what he does in dedication to his cause is incredibly jerkish, but that's getting ahead of myself. The real point when I switched from thinking he was an interesting dedicated character to an asshat was his paranoia about Aveline. It doesn't make sense when looking at the characters and who mocks a widows dead husband? I mean really, who does that?

As for next title, hipster Qun is the best.

[Zeb The Troll]

Troll Patrol: New thread is linked and this thread is now officially old. Closed.